The Holy Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, during its meeting on 9-11 January 2019, following its decision of 11 October 2018 to restaure a stauropegion of the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Kiev, one of the many stavropigia that the Ecumenical Patriarchate used to have in Ukraine in the past centuries, has appointed as its head The Very Reverend Archimandrite of the Ecumenical Throne Michael Anishchenko, who headed until now the Orthodox Community in Antalya (Turkey) of the Holy Metropolis of Pisidia.

The Third International Forum on Modern Slavery organized by the Ecumenical Patriarchate with the theme “Awareness, Action and Impact” took place in Istanbul, Turkey on 5-8 January 2019. Recognizing that modern slavery is a global scourge that traps millions of people to lives of suffering, injustice and humiliation, His All-Holiness established a Task Force on Modern Slavery as a commitment of the Ecumenical Patriarchate to learn, to act and to witness towards the elimination of the interconnected forms of visible and invisible enslavement affecting over 46 million people worldwide. The first Forum, “Sins Before Our Eyes,” was held in Istanbul, Turkey, in February 2017. The second Forum, “Old Problems in the New World,” was held in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in May 2018. Continue reading →

On Saturday, January 5, 2019, His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew signed the Tomos of Autocephaly, thereby officially granting autocephaly to the Orthodox Church in Ukraine. Present for this special ceremony, which took place in the Venerable Patriarchal Church of Saint George, were His Beatitude Metropolitan Epiphanios of Kyiv and all Ukraine, His Excellency Petro Poroshenko, President of Ukraine, numerous Ukrainian government officials and members of parliament, Hierarchs of the Throne and several international press and media outlets. Continue reading →