From the Ivory Tower to the Grass Roots: Ending Orthodox Oppression of Evangelicals, and Beginning Grassroots Fellowship

When considering the relationship between the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Evangelical Church, can we both celebrate progress towards unity, while acknowledging where growth must still occur? Dr. George Hancock-Stefan, who fled the oppressive communist regime of Yugoslavia with the rest of his Baptist family, now frequently returns to Eastern Europe to explore topics of modern theology. During these travels, he has recognized a concerning trend: the religious unity and interfaith fellowship celebrated in Western academia does not reach the Eastern European local level. This is primarily due to the fact that Orthodoxy is a top to bottom institution, and nothing happens at the local level unless approved by the top. This lack of religious unity and cooperation at the local level is also due to the fact that the Eastern Orthodox Church claims a national Christian monopoly and the presence of Evangelicals is considered an invasion. In this article, Dr. Hancock-Stefan unpacks the history of the spiritual revivals that took place in various Eastern Orthodox Churches in the 19th–20th centuries, as well as the policies established by the national patriarchs after the fall of communism that are now jeopardizing the relationship between Orthodox and Evangelicals. By addressing this friction with candor and Christian love, this article pleads for the Orthodox Church to relinquish its monopoly and hopes that both Orthodox and Evangelicals will start considering each other to be brothers and sisters in Christ.

The Eastern Orthodox Bible in China

This essay surveys the arrival of the Eastern Orthodox Church by Russian Orthodox missionaries to China. It examines how, in the development of the Eastern Orthodox Church in China, the Chinese Orthodox Bible came into being from the Church Slavonic Bible: the 1864 Xin Yi Zhao Sheng Jing (The New Testament), the 1879 Sheng Yong Jing (The Psalms), the 1910 Xin Yue Sheng Jing (The New Testament), the 1911 Ma Te Fei Yi Sheng Fu Yin Jing (The Gospel of Matthew). Other biblically related materials are discussed, such as the catechesis and liturgies: Tian Shen Hui Ke (Conversation of the Angels), Dong Jiao Zong Jian (Mirror of Orthodox Confession), Jiao Yi Wen Da (Catechesis), Quan Gao Jie Wen (The Catechetical Instruction on Confession).

Benedict XVI’s Participation in the Ecumenical Dialogue with the Orthodox Church

The author of this article presents the involvement of Benedict XVI in the ecumenical dialogue with the Eastern Orthodox Church as a whole based on speeches, declarations and homilies delivered to representatives of this Church. Undoubtedly, it is significant. As a pope, he encouraged this dialogue by his authority, fraternal treatment filled with friendship and love, meetings, communal prayer and teaching. He overcame various difficulties and contributing to the progress of this dialogue. He emphasized joint theological research, because without the unity of faith there is no complete and visible unity. As always – as the theologian and as the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith – he taught that common celebration of the Eucharist could take place only in full unity: when will it happen? It is God’s gift for which we have to pray and work at the same time: to evangelize together, to resist ideologies hostile to Christianity and humanity, to care for peace and justice among Christians and followers of other religions, and to cooperate in charitable work for the poor, the sick and the needy.

The new Ukrainian Autocephalous Church and its image in the ecumenical space

An important moment in the recent history of the Eastern Orthodox Church was for sure the recognition granted to the Ukrainian Orthodoxy by the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople with the Tomos of autocephaly (2019). Praised by some Orthodox churches and damned by other, it was preceded by some attempts of negotiation initiated by the Ecumenical Patriarchate and by a few meetings between the representatives of the aforementioned institution, Russian Patriarchate and the Ukrainian local churches that was later recognised by Constantinople and by a Schism between the Constantinople and Moscow. At the same time, it divided the local Orthodox churches between the ones who sustain one or the other side or prefer to remain in a neutral state and determined later meetings like the one from Amman in Jordan (2020), between leaders and representatives of the Orthodox Church. Conscious of the relevance of the event and its potential consequences, we have tried here to see how it was reflected in the ecumenical space. Therefore, we have proceeded to the investigation of the journals from the ecumenical area that spoke about it, and we analysed the way how they saw it and emphasised the main elements that have raised their interest. Together with the ecclesiastical challenges, we found that they were also interested in this problem not only for its theological meaning but also because of its geopolitical relevance. The research, based on the literature investigated, therefore presents the Ukrainian problem and its image in the ecumenical space.Contribution: The research investigates how the image of the Eastern Orthodox Church changed in the ecumenical space after the foundation of the New Ukrainian Church and the debates that followed inside of the Orthodox space in this context. It is linked with the scope of the journal due to the fact that investigates a topic relevant for the ecumenical area and presents a topic that can contribute in the future to the change of the relationships with different churches with the Orthodox one.

Implementasi Algoritma Raita Pada Aplikasi Hukum Kanonik Berbasis Mobile

Canonical law is an internal church law governing the Catholic Church, Eastern Orthodox Church, Eastern Orthodox Church, Anglican Communion. How the laws of the church are governed, interpreted and sometimes examined differ fundamentally between the three church bodies. in all three traditions, a canon was originally a rule accepted by an assembly, these canons formed the basis for canon law. Raita algorithm is part of the exact string matching algorithm, which is matching the string exactly with the arrangement of characters in the matched string that has the same number or sequence of characters in the string. Matching strings on the raita algorithm is done through a shift from the right of the character then to the left of the character and to the middle of the character. The problem in this research is the content of canon law in general consists of a very large number of pages of books, this makes it difficult for canonical law users to find the contents needed, then in the search it takes time to find the contents of canonical law that are searched for too many search problems. that is, too much time must be needed to find the contents of the canonical law sought