Orthodox Leader to Visit Amid Tensions

The impending U.S. tour by the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I is a source of pride for Eastern Orthodox Christians in this country but comes amid tensions inside the host Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of North America.

Only once before has an ecumenical patriarch, a Greek Orthodox figure regarded as “first among equals” by many Orthodox patriarchs, visited the United States.

Dimitrios I came in 1990 and included San Francisco on his itinerary.

Bartholomew, whose four-week trip begins Oct. 19 in Washington, D.C., will visit the Los Angeles area Nov. 7-9, and will make a stop at an environmental conference in Santa Barbara.

The patriarch, who lives in Istanbul, will find a restive U.S. church. When Bartholomew last year appointed a successor to Archbishop Iakovos, who had led the Greek Orthodox in the Americas for 37 years as head of the New York City-based archdiocese, the patriarch chose the first ever U.S.-born prelate for the post.

The new official, Archbishop Spyridon, who spent 12 years of his young life in Tarpon Springs, Fla., was initially cheered as a churchman likely to be sensitive to American culture and aspirations. (The archdiocese now covers only North America.)

But several actions of the 57-year-old archbishop have prompted criticism that he is heavy-handed in asserting authority and that he is rebuffing the hopes of Orthodox Christians of varied national backgrounds to work toward an independent status for a pan-Orthodox Church in America.

In an interview this week in Los Angeles, Spyridon said U.S. Orthodox churches must “fight isolationism” and reinforce relationships with Orthodox patriarchs abroad.

“I would say openly that I don’t think that as Orthodox Christians we are mature enough to separate ourselves from our mother churches,” the archbishop said. He added that the 1.5 million Greek Orthodox Christians in North America have a growing shortage of parish priests and a lack of enough priestly candidates to become bishops.

Some of the main complaints against Spyridon came this year after a student at Holy Cross Seminary in Brookline, Mass., punched a visiting Greek cleric who the seminarian alleged made sexual advances. The cleric was sent home amid charges of a cover-up. Spyridon fired the school’s president and some tenured faculty who protested his decision. All were later appointed to other posts, though the controversy has remained.

Referring to himself, Spyridon said, “A newcomer comes in and brings in his own people, and certain people have to go. Whether they are satisfied or not is secondary really. What is important is whether the work of the church goes forward.”

On another front, prominent Greek Orthodox layman Nicholas Royce of North Hollywood and others criticized the upcoming tour of the ecumenical patriarch as overloaded with “events for the wealthy.” He cited a black-tie affair in New York City costing $2,500 for two tickets.

“That is definitely wrong,” said Greek Orthodox Bishop Anthony of San Francisco, whose diocese oversees 63 parishes in seven Western states, including 45 in California. Aside from two private fund-raising events, in New York and Los Angeles, Anthony said, the various dinners are priced to cover expenses--including the $150-a-plate banquet Nov. 8 at the Westin Bonaventure Hotel in Los Angeles.

“There are very strong pastoral dimensions to this visit,” Spyridon added. “His Holiness will be celebrating liturgy before about 20,000 people at Madison Square Garden, and he will meet with youth after that, in Chicago and in Los Angeles”--the latter Nov. 8 at the Convention Center.

On his first day in Los Angeles, Nov. 7, Bartholomew will visit Berendo Middle School, then walk four blocks with 1,000 schoolchildren and city, church and business leaders through the largely Spanish-speaking community to St. Sophia Greek Orthodox Cathedral. The gesture will symbolize the cathedral’s effort to aid the surrounding community, a spokesman said.

GRANT

The Claremont School of Theology has received a $500,000 grant from the Lilly Endowment to help seminarians and pastors become more savvy with finances and the Internet. “Theological educators have devoted surprisingly little systematic thought to the task of leadership development” and administrative expertise, said Scott Cormode, an assistant professor of church administration and finance at the seminary. Cormode, who was at Yale University last year, studied computer engineering at UC San Diego and holds a master of divinity degree from Fuller Seminary in Pasadena.

CLARIFICATION

Mt. St. Mary’s College in Los Angeles was one of eight Southern California colleges and universities named on the recently announced John Templeton Foundation Honor Roll for Character Building Colleges. The school was inadvertently omitted in the Aug. 30 Southern California File.

CEMETERIES

Mortuaries with California Mission-style architecture will be built at six Catholic cemeteries in the Los Angeles archdiocese under an agreement announced by the archdiocese and Stewart Enterprises, which will lease the land. The additions will allow indoor funerals to be held at the cemeteries. The mortuary at All Souls Cemetery in Long Beach is expected to be finished first, in the fall of 1998. Others will be at church-run cemeteries in Montebello, East Los Angeles, Culver City, Rowland Heights and Mission Hills.

DATES

Another Chance, a substance abuse program at Brookins Community African Methodist Episcopal Church, 4831 Gramercy Place, Los Angeles, will offer counseling to people who have problems with overeating, anger and other bad habits, said Pastor Frederick O. Murph. Participants meet at 7 p.m. Thursdays at the church’s educational center. (213) 296-5610.

* Retired Salvation Army Gen. Eva Burrows, who headed the international evangelical and relief agency from 1986 to 1993, will preach at the 9:30 a.m. and 11 a.m. services Sunday at the Crystal Cathedral, 12141 Lewis St., Garden Grove. The Salvation Army’s Tabernacle Songsters will sing. (714) 971-4000.

* AIDS Masses will be celebrated in at least six Episcopal parishes at 4 p.m. Sunday in the Los Angeles diocese. Bishop Frederick Borsch will celebrate Mass at St. Luke’s, 525 E. 7th St., Long Beach. Other rites in this annual event will be at Trinity Church, 1500 N. State St., Santa Barbara; Trinity Church, 650 N. Berendo Ave., Los Angeles; St. Edmund’s Church, 1175 San Gabriel Blvd., San Marino; St. John’s Church, 1407 Arrowhead Ave., San Bernardino; and St. Mary’s Church, 428 Park Ave., Laguna Beach.

FINALLY

St. John’s Episcopal Church, a downtown Los Angeles parish with a stone facade at 514 W. Adams Blvd., will conduct its Eucharist liturgy on the light and fanciful side at 10 a.m. Sunday.

Celebrating the feast day of St. John, parish leaders decided to take a circus theme with clowns, jugglers and numbers from the musical “Godspell.”

“Be a Fool for Christ” is the day’s theme, taken from the Apostle Paul’s advice to the Corinthians (1 Corinthians 4:10) that “we are fools for Christ’s sake,” that is, foolishly faithful in the eyes of the worldly wise.

Notices may be mailed for consideration to Southern California File, c/o John Dart, L.A. Times, 20000 Prairie St., Chatsworth, CA 91311, faxed to the Religion desk (818) 772-3385, or e-mailed to john.dart@latimes.com Items should arrive two to three weeks before the event, except for spot news, and should include pertinent details about the people and organizations, with address, phone number, date and time.