Important News

Serbian Orthodox Church commemorates Solzhenitsyn

The Serbian Orthodox Church has held a memorial service for Nobel Prize winner Alexander Solzhenitsyn and praised him as a friend of the Serbian people. The service was held at Saborna Crkva or the Cathedral Church in the Serbian capital Belgrade. Many prominent Serbs attended.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn buried in Donskoy Monastery

The body of outstanding Russian writer and public figure Alexander Solzhenitsyn was buried at the cemetery of the Donskoy Monastery in Moscow on Wednesday. Archbishop Alexy of Orekhovo-Zuyevo, the Russian Patriarch's vicar, conducted a mourning service.

President Dmitry Medvedev attended. The ceremony was without speeches. Guards of Honor had brought the coffin from the monastery's Grand Cathedral to the sound of church hymns.

Source: Interfax

4th Meeting of the Canonical Bishops in the West Coast

Father Miguel Arranz S.J. passed away

On July 16, 2008 Father Miguel Arranz S.J., the well-known liturgics professor who taught at the Pontifical Oriental Institute in Rome, in Moscow and in St Petersburg, passed away. The funeral took place two days later, at the Jesuit chapel of the Vatican Curia in the Vatican.

European court allowed recourse to appeal for the Orthodox patriarch in Constantinople

The European Supreme Court for Human Rights in Strasbourg has allowed recourse to appeal for the Ecumenical Patriarchate against the Turkish States illegal occupation of the Orphanage on the prince Buyukada islands, in Marmara Sea, claiming ownership.

It is the world's largest wooden structure and though it has lain completely abandoned since 1962, its majesty still dominates the panorama of the Island. It was built in 1898 by a French company and was destined for the use of a luxury hotel and casino, but the then Sultan Abdulhamid II did not grant the licence. It was then bought over by the Turkish banker of Greek origins Zafiris, who donated it to the Ecumenical Patriarchate to transform it into an Orthodox orphanage and school. The donation received the Sultan's blessing who sanctioned the move by living formal ownership to the Patriarchate in a donation act of 150 gold lires for charity.

Vandals attack Orthodox cemetery in Tuzla

Unknown individuals attempted to break into the Church of St. George at Trnovac cemetery in Tuzla yesterday, said local priest Niko Tošić.Tošić said that the culprits had broken a door, and smashed some of the chapel's windows. The priest said that property belonging to the Serbian Orthodox Church (SPC) in Tuzla had been attacked and damaged over 50 times in the course of the last seven years, and three times so far this year.