Romanian Orthodox Church
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The Romanian Orthodox Church (Biserica Ortodoxă Română in Romanian) is a autocephalous Eastern Orthodox church. A majority of Romanians (18,817,975, or 86.8% of the population, according to the 2002 census data[1]) belong to it, as well as a significant number of Moldovans.
The mere numbers of Romanians make the Romanian Orthodox Church arguably (as there is no credible statistics for the Moscow Patriarchate's membership) second only to the Russian Orthodox Church in size.
Adherents of the Romanian Orthodox Church sometimes refer to it as Dreapta credinţă ("right/correct belief"; compare to Greek ὀρθὴ δόξα, "straight/correct belief"). Orthodox believers are also sometimes known as dreptcredincioşi or dreptmăritori creştini.
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[edit] History
- See also: History of Christianity in Romania
[edit] The Church in the Kingdom of Romania
In 1859, the Romanian principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia formed the modern state of Romania. The hierarchy of the Orthodox churches tends to follow the structure of the state. Therefore, shortly afterwards, in 1872, the Orthodox churches of the former principalities (the Metropolis of Ungrovlahia and the Metropolis of Moldavia) decided to unite to form the Romanian Orthodox Church.
The 1866 Romanian Constitution declared the Orthodox Church to be "independent of any foreign hierarchy", but it was a law passed in 1872 that declared the church to be "autocephalous". After a long period of negociations with the Patriarchate of Constantinople, it finally recognized in 1885 the Metropolis of Romania, which was raised to the rank of Patriarchy in 1925.[2]
[edit] The Communist regime
The Communist government, which saw religion as a capitalist remnant, recognizing the power the Church had among the masses and through the 1948 Law of Cults, the Church became tightly controlled by the state.[3] Many monasteries were transformed into craft centers and priests were encouraged to learn other 'worldly' jobs.
The Communist Party named Justinian Marina, a communist sympathizer and personal friend of Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej, who reoriented the church to have a positive outlook towads the Communist regime. [3] Many members of the clergy who dissented: until 1963 as many as 2,500 individual priests and monks were arrested and further 2,000 monks were forced to give up the monastic life, but the Orthodox Church anounced that it was not religious persecution.[3]
While the dissenters were sentenced to fairly long terms in prison, there were also many priests who collaborated and were informers for Securitate, the secret police. In 2001, the Romanian Orthodox Church tried unsuccessfully to change the law which allowed access to the archives of Securitate, in order to deny public access to the files of the priests who collaborated with the Securitate.
In 1948 the Romanian Church United with Rome, Greek-Catholic was outlawed, and all its assets, including churches, were handed over to the Orthodox church. After the fall of the Communist regime, the Greek Catholics requested that their churches be returned, but so far only 16 of the 2600 claimed churches have been returned. There are reports that several old Greek Catholic churches were demolished while under the administration of the Orthodox Church [1]
[edit] Since 1989
After the 1989 Romanian Revolution, the Church never admited of willingly collaborating with the regime, but some bishops did admit of collaborating, the first one being Nicolae Corneanu, the Metropolitan of Banat, who admited his efforts on the behalf of the Communist party and denounced "the Church's prostitution with the Communist regime".[3]
As Romania became a democracy, the Church was freed from state control, although the state still provides clergy with their salaries.
[edit] The Church in Moldova
Romanians in the Republic of Moldova belonging to the Metropolis of Bessarabia (Romanian: Mitropolia Basarabiei), having resisted Russification for 192 years (after the annexation of Bessarabia by the Russian Empire in 1812), are 2 million strong in 2004. In 2001 they won a landmark legal victory against the Government of the Republic of Moldova at the Strasbourg-based European Court of Human Rights.
This means that despite current political issues, the Metropolis of Bessarabia is now recognized as "the rightful successor" to the Metropolitan Church of Bessarabia and Hotin, which existed from 1918 to 1940 and was only brought by Joseph Stalin under the jurisdiction of the Russian Orthodox Church's Moscow patriarchate.
[edit] Unique features
The Romanian Orthodox Church is the only Orthodox church using a Romance language in the divine liturgy.
Byzantine religious records also mention a unique form of bishoprics in the region - namely the chorepiscopate or countryside episcopate - as opposed to the better-known religious centers in large cities. This can possibly be compared to the "monastic bishops" of Ireland, who united the functions of countryside Abbot with that of district Bishop in another country that did not emphasize an urban episcopate, at least for a time.
[edit] Organization
The Romanian Orthodox Church is organized as the Romanian Patriarchate. The highest hierarchical, canonical and dogmatical authority of the Romanian Orthodox Church is the Holy Synod.
There are six Metropolitanates and ten archbishoprics in Romania, and more than twelve thousand priests and deacons, servant fathers of ancient altars from parishes, monasteries and social centres. Almost 400 monasteries exist inside the country for some 3,500 monks and 5,000 nuns. Three Diasporan Metropolitanates and two Diasporan Bishoprics function outside Romania proper. As of 2004, there are, inside Romania, fifteen theological universities where more than ten thousand students (some of them from Bessarabia, Bukovina and Serbia benefiting from a few Romanian fellowships) currently study for a doctoral degree. More than 14,500 churches (traditionally named "lăcaşe de cult", or worshiping places) exist in Romania for the Romanian Orthodox believers. As of 2002, almost 1,000 of these were either in the process of being built or rebuilt.
[edit] Relations with other Orthodox jurisdictions
Most Eastern Orthodox autocephalous churches, including the Romanian, maintain a respectful spiritual link to the Ecumenical Patriarch. Now in office is His All-Holiness Bartholomew I, Patriarch of Constantinople and New Rome.
In December 2007 Russian Duma United Russia’s MP Konstantin Zatulin accused the Romanian Orthodox Church of “proselytism” against the Russian Orthodox Church in Moldova (and Transnistria) with the aim of annexing these territories into Romania.[4]
[edit] Famous theologians
Rev. Dumitru Stăniloae (1903 - 1993) is ranked among the greatest Orthodox theologians of the 20th century, having written extensively in all major fields of Eastern Christian systematic theology. One of his other major achievements in theology is the 45-year-long comprehensive series on Orthodox spirituality known as the Romanian Philocaly, a collection of texts written by classical Byzantine writers, that he edited and translated from Greek.
Father Archimandrite Ilie Cleopa (1912 - 1998), elder of the Sihastria Monastery, is considered as one of the most representative spiritual fathers of contemporary Romanian Orthodox monastic spirituality.[5]
[edit] List of Patriarchs
- Miron (1925-1939)
- Nicodim (1939-1948)
- Iustinian (1948-1977)
- Iustin (1977-1986)
- Teoctist (1986-2007)
- Daniel (since 2007)
[edit] Current leaders of the Church
The chair is currently held by Daniel I, Archbishop of Bucharest, Metropolitan of Ungro-Vlachia (Muntenia or Wallachia and Dobrogea or Dobrudja) and Patriarch of All of the Romanian Orthodox Church, Locum Tenens of Caesarea in Cappadocia.
- (vacant), Metropolitan of Moldova and Bucovina [2]
- Petru, Metropolitan of Bessarabia
- Laurenţiu Streza, Metropolitan of Transylvania, Locum Tenens Bishop/Vicar of Vârşeţ, Serbia [3]
- Bartolomeu Anania, Metropolitan of Cluj, Alba, Crişana and Maramureş
- Iosif, Archbishop of Paris and Metropolitan of France, Western and Southern Europe [4]
- Serafim, Metropolitan of Germany and Central Europe
- Nicolae, The Most Reverend Archbishop of America and Canada
[edit] See also
- Romanian National Salvation Cathedral
- List of Patriarchs of All Romania
- List of religious buildings in Romania
- Romanian icons
- Frumuşeni Mosaics
- Byzantium after Byzantium
- Religion in Romania
- Orthodox Church of France
- Orthodox Church in America Romanian Episcopate
- List of members of the Holy Synod of the Romanian Orthodox Church
- Religious education in Romania
[edit] Notes
- ^ 2002 census data on religion
- ^ Keith Hitchins, Rumania 1866-1947, Clarendon Press, 1994, p. 92
- ^ a b c d Lavinia Stan and Lucian Turcescu, "The Romanian Orthodox Church and Post-Communist Democratization," Europe-Asia Studies, vol. 52, no. 8 (December 2000), pp. 1467-1488
- ^ Romanian Patriarchate’s activity aimed at Moldova’s absorption by Romania: Konstantin Zatulin, REGNUM News Agency, December 5, 2007
- ^ Electronic version of Dicţionarul teologilor români (Dictionary of Romanian Theologians), Univers Enciclopedic Ed., Bucharest, 1996, retrieved from http://biserica.org/WhosWho/DTR/I/IlieCleopa.html.
[edit] External links
- Romanian Patriarchy
- The Metropolitanate of Moldavia and Bucovina and the Archdiocese of Iaşi
- (Romanian) Boscorodirea
- Romanian Orthodox Church
- (Romanian) Portal Ortodox Românesc
- (Romanian) Romanian Patriarchs
- (English) Pilgrimage Centre in Iaşi, Romania
[edit] Romanian Orthodoxy outside Romania
- Moldova: Government Fails in Bessarabian Church Appeal
- Metropolitan Church of Bessarabia and Others v. Moldova
- (French) Romanian Orthodox Metropolitanate of Western and Southern Europe
- (Romanian)/(German) Romanian Orthodox Metropolitanate of Germany and Central Europe
- (Romanian)/(French) Romanian Church of Paris
| Autocephalous and Autonomous Churches of Eastern Orthodoxy |
| Autocephalous Churches |
| Four Ancient Patriarchates: Constantinople | Alexandria | Antioch | Jerusalem Russia | Serbia | Romania | Bulgaria | Georgia Cyprus | Greece | Poland | Albania | Czechia and Slovakia | OCA* |
| Autonomous Churches |
| Sinai* | Finland | Estonia* | Japan* | China* | Ukraine | Western Europe* | Bessarabia* | Moldova* | Ohrid* | ROCOR** |
| The * designates a church whose autocephaly or autonomy is not universally recognized. The ** designates a semi-autonomous part of the Russian Orthodox Church. |
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| State-recognised | Romanian Orthodox Church · Serbian Orthodox Diocese of Timişoara · Roman Catholic Church (Armenian-Catholic Vicariate) · Romanian Greek-Catholic Church · Armenian Apostolic Church · Lipovan Orthodox Old-Rite Church · Reformed Church in Romania · Evangelical Church of Augustan Confession · Evangelical Lutheran Church · Unitarian Church of Transylvania · Baptist Union of Romania (Hungarian Baptist Convention) · Christian Evangelical · Evangelical · Pentecostal Union of Romania · Seventh-day Adventist Church · Judaism · Islam · Jehovah's Witnesses |
| Not state-recognised | Old Calendar Romanian Orthodox Church · Ukrainian Orthodox Vicariate · Hinduism |
