wfn.org | Spyridon to Attend Meeting about U.S. Church Leadership

[PCUSA NEWS <pcusa.news@ecunet.org>]

9-Aug-1999 
99256 
 
    Spyridon to Attend Meeting about U.S. Church Leadership 
 
    Some Greek Orthodox Congregations Threaten to Withdraw 
    Unless He's Replaced 
 
    by Chris Herlinger 
    Ecumenical News International 
 
NEW YORK - Archbishop Spyridon, leader of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of 
America, will return to Orthodox headquarters in Istanbul later this month 
for meetings with Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomeos to discuss his future 
as head of the  archdiocese, according to media reports. 
 
    At a meeting last month between Archbishop Spyridon and church leaders 
at the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Istanbul, the archbishop was, according 
to the reports, given a month to work out differences with a number of U.S. 
parishes and dioceses critical of his leadership of the 1.5 million-member 
church, the biggest Orthodox church in the United States. The church falls 
within the jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarch. 
 
    Mark Arey, Archbishop Spyridon's spokesman, told ENI that no date had 
yet been set for the meeting in Istanbul, but that it was likely to take 
place after the middle of the month. 
 
    Arey described the media articles about the ultimatum, reported by the 
international agency Associated Press, among others, as "a very broad 
statement."  But Arey also said he was not trying to "minimize" the 
situation, since it was clear that "there are serious concerns" before the 
church. 
 
    The spokesman added that neither he nor the archbishop would respond to 
what he called "hyperbolic" press coverage by the media in Greece - where 
the Orthodox Church world-wide is a matter of general interest - over 
Archbishop Spyridon's leadership. 
 
    But Arey confirmed that Greek media had reported that the Ecumenical 
Patriarch may be considering naming Archbishop Spyridon as his 
representative to the World Council of Churches (WCC) in Geneva.  The post 
has recently fallen vacant following the retirement of Georges Tsetsis who 
devoted more than 30 years of his ministry to ecumenism. 
 
    Arey said he knew nothing more about the possibility, and he expected 
the archbishop to remain as head of the church in the U.S. 
 
    "I have absolutely no reason to believe otherwise," Arey told ENI. 
 
    For more than a year, the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America has 
been caught up in controversy over Archbishop Spyridon's leadership. 
 
    In June, the Clergy Laity Conference of the Greek Orthodox Diocese of 
Boston, Mass., endorsed, by a 58-51 vote, a call made earlier this year by 
five U.S. metropolitans (bishops) for Archbishop Spyridon to be replaced. 
The critics accused him of  governing the church in an authoritarian 
manner. 
 
    The archdiocese was "suffocating in an atmosphere of fear, suspicion, 
insecurity, lack of trust and vindictiveness," the metropolitans said in a 
statement in January.  Patriarch Bartholomeos, who appointed Archbishop 
Spyridon to succeed the popular Archbishop Iakovos in 1996, rejected the 
metropolitans' request. 
 
    The controversy has raised the spectre of a damaging split within the 
church.  A leading lay dissident group, Greek Orthodox American Leaders 
(GOAL),  has been leading criticism of the archbishop.  GOAL has run a 
campaign  to persuade parishes to withhold funds from the national 
archdiocese. 
 
    GOAL issued a statement in July, during Archbishop Spyridon's visit to 
Istanbul, saying that if the Ecumenical Patriarch made what it called 
"another mistaken appointment," activist movements for an independent U.S. 
church would "grow and thrive" and "full financial withholding [would] 
become a daily centerpiece of Greek Orthodox life in America." 
 
    "We are determined not to be hoodwinked again," said GOAL spokesman 
Dean Popps, pledging "persistent, vocal and organized hard-core 
resistance." 
 
    However, apparently only a handful - less than a dozen - of the 500 
U.S. parishes are withholding funds. 
 
    Arey has accused GOAL of being unfair to Archbishop Spyridon, who he 
said wanted the U.S. church to reconnect with its Greek roots.  At the same 
time, Arey has stressed that some GOAL members have, in effect, been 
seeking an American "congregational" model of church governance, which was 
not possible in the Orthodox Church. 

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