ECUMENICAL NOTES:

Poetry, Prayer and Theology

From Jerusalem the Apostles carried the Faith northwards to Antioch, where they were first called Christians (Acts of the Apostles, 11.26 )

The Holy Apostles Peter & Paul both ministered in Jerusalem and Antioch before they came to minister in Rome. ( cf. link below, Peter's First See)

Our Oriental Orthodox Church, the Malankara Church, has its origins in these very first Christian communities of Jerusalem, Antioch, and across the ancient Near East.

Within the inspired geography of the Ancient Near East, commonly named the Christian Orient, Divine Revelation and history make for a radiant interplay of semitic poetry & hymnody, hellenistic rhetoric, hebrew psalmody & liturgies recollected and renewed within the Christian witness of the Gospel, the martyrs & monastics, and the patristic theologies.



St. John of Patmos
written by the hand of Heather Durka

This radiant interplay of geography and history climaxes in a most beautiful and brilliant synthesis of poetry, prayer, and theology: The West Syriac Divine Liturgy of St. James of Jerusalem.

Wonderfully lyrical, deeply biblical, very semitic and very patristic, the rite is truly a lovesong — indeed, the Song of Songs of Christianity’s major rites of the eucharistic liturgy.

EASTERN ORTHODOX and ORIENTAL ORTHODOX CHURCHES


• Eastern Orthodox and Syrian Orthodox Churches



• Malankara Orthodox Seminary Statement regarding shared Christology and Communion



• NEW PHOTOS of hierarchs & seminarians: Malankara Orthodox seminarians at St Vladimir Eastern Orthodox Seminary



• North American Malankara Orthodox seminarians enroll at St. Tikhon Eastern Orthodox Seminary



• Eastern & Oriental Orthodox Symposium 2004:
  On Saints and Sanctity



• Interpretation of Christological Agreements
by Coptic Metropolitan Bishoy (click on link under "Dialogue With Byzantine Orthodox") The Oriental Orthodox Churches share faith with the Eastern Orthodox Churches.


• more of Metropolitan Bishoy's Christological Dialogues & Discourses







ORIENTAL ORTHODOX and CATHOLIC CHURCHES

• Christology: Oriental Orthodox and Roman Catholic Churches


• Ecclesiology: Oriental Orthodox and Roman Catholic Churches


• Filioque: Official Bishops Consultation of Orthodox & Catholic Churches Agree


• Declaration of Catholic Pope & Syriac Patriarch on Sacraments & Church


• Declaration on Marriage and shared Communion between Malankara Syrian Orthodox & Roman Catholic Churches


• JOINT COMMISSION BETWEEN THE CATHOLIC CHURCH AND THE MALANKARA SYRIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH


EASTERN CHURCHES re. PRIMACY IN THE CHURCHES

• Peter's First See


• Metropolitan Ioannis Zizioulas of Pergamum on ecclesiology: Eucharist & the Catholica