On January 21, 2019, the annual Christmas dinner held was at the Reception House of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs at the invitation of leaders of the Russian foreign affairs department. Among the guests from the Church were Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk, chairman of the Moscow Patriarchate department for external church relations (DECR), Archpriest…

President of Russia Mr. Vladimir Putin, accompanied by President of the Republic of Serbia Mr. Aleksandar Vucic, visited the Saint Sava Cathedral in the Vracar district in the evening of 17 January 2019. His Holiness Serbian Patriarch Irinej welcomed the dear guest from Russia with a warm greeting in the Testimonial Cathedral of the Serbian…

While mainstream media portrayed the 2019 March for Life as being attended by “thousands” and “tens of thousands”, a time-lapse video of the Jan. 18 event from beginning to end paints a rather different picture which suggests a much higher number, Life Site reports. Getting an accurate count of so large a crowd would be…

The current primate of the Albanian Orthodox Church celebrates his name day. Monkmartyr Anastasius the Persian is the spiritual protector of His Beatitude Arch. Anastasios. His Beatitude Arch. Anastasios of Tirana, Durres and All Albania, was born on November 4, 1929, in Piraeus, Greece. Archbishop Anastasios (Yannoulatos) Professor of History of Religions (1972-92) and Dean…

His Beatitude Archbishop Anastasios of Albania received an honorary award of the Athanassios Botsis Foundation for the Promotion of Journalism during a ceremony held at Sarogleio Palace in Athens on Thursday, January 17, 2019. The award was handed over to the Albanian Archbishop by His Excellency, Prokopis Pavlopoulos, President of the Hellenic Republic, for His…

For the first time in history, an Ecumenical Patriarch celebrated the Divine Liturgy in Triglia (Tirilye), in the Province of Bursa, and the ceremony of the Blessing of the Waters with the diving for the Cross in the Sea of Marmara. It was the first time for 97 years that a diving for the Cross…

His Beatitude Patriarch Theophilos III of Jerusalem celebrated the great feast of Theophany today in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. Notably, he did not concelebrate with any representatives from the Ukrainian schismatic church. OrthoChristian reported on January 11 that His Beatitude and the Jerusalem Patriarchate were under heavy pressure from the Patriarchate…

Leader of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU), Metropolitan of Kyiv and All Ukraine Epifaniy has said the first synod of the new Ukrainian church will be held after the enthronement of its head. “The preparations are underway for those things that have already been voiced, because we are preparing for enthronement,” he said in…

Ukraine’s Verkhovnaya Rada has passed a bill outlining a mechanism governing changes in subordination for religious communities. The bill, which amends the laws on subordination of religious organizations and procedures of state registration of religious organizations with the status of legal entity, was supported by 229 MPs at a plenary session of the Verkhovnaya Rada…