Orthodox officials warn against caricatures of Muhammad

    

Georgian Orthodox Church celebrates Epiphany

Georgian Priest Reported Dead After Greek Ferry Fire

          

Georgian Orthodox Church Offering Services in English

   

Cave Monastery Carved in Rock

Meet A Modern Day Monk Who Lives Atop A Pillar

 

 In an isolated part of the Caucasus, a monk is spending his days in prayer and silence atop a 40-meter pillar of limestone in western Georgia (near the town of Chiatura).

Georgian patriarch against local government reform

BILISI, -- The Georgian parliament has postponed the adoption of a landmark bill that will drastically change local government, after the draft Self-Governance Code was harshly criticized by the influential head of the Georgian Church.

Georgian Patriarchate against LGBT-sponsored shelter for homeless children

           

Tbilisi, - The Georgian Patriarchate believes that an initiative of the Identity non-governmental organization, which defends LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) rights, to set up a shelter for homeless children in Tbilisi is dangerous.

GEORGIA: Orthodox clergy break into a trot and lead an angry mob in an attack on a gay-rights rally....

 

 

Many were shocked on May 17 to see a phalanx of black-robed Orthodox clergy break into a trot and lead an angry mob in an attack on a gay-rights rally in the Georgian capital, Tbilisi.
Although the official Orthodox hierarchy in Georgia denounced the violence that left 17 injured, Georgian Patriarch Illia II had called on authorities the day before to ban the rally as an "insult" to Georgian traditions.
Across Eastern Europe, societies in countries such as Georgia, Russia, Serbia, and Moldova are pushing, each in its own way, to modernize and reform -- and movements supporting the rights of women, ethnic minorities, and homosexuals are making unprecedented inroads. What many also have in common, though, are Orthodox churches that often act as brakes, politically and socially conservative forces that tend to view any innovation as a foreign threat aimed at destroying sacred national traditions....

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RUSSIA: Alexander Nevsky's relic to go to Georgia

Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Kirill has given a relic of Russian Prince and Saint Alexander Nevsky to the Georgian Orthodox Church.

The ceremony took place after the liturgy in the Assumption Cathedral of the Moscow Kremlin conducted by Patriarch Kirill and Catholicos-Patriarch of All Georgia Ilia II.

Patriarch Kirill said that 2013 marked 750 years since the Prince’s death and stressed that St. Alexander Nevsky was also venerated in Georgia and the capital of Georgia Tbilisi had a St. Alexander Nevsky Church.

St. Maximos Orthodox Church, Owego, New York (VIDEO)

A documentary on the building of a traditional Orthodox parish using traditional construction techniques. St Maximos Orthodox Church is a parish of the Holy Metropolis of the Genuine Greek Orthodox Church of America.

The Orthodox christian nation of Georgia - VIDEO (amazing!)

RUSSIA: Georgian Church Leader to Meet Putin in Moscow

Head of the Georgian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Ilia II, will meet Russia’s President Vladimir Putin in Moscow on January 23, according to the Georgian Patriarchate.

 

Patriarch Ilia II, who left for Moscow on Sunday, is visiting Russia to receive an award from Russian Orthodox Church’s International Foundation for the Unity of Orthodox Christian Nations (IFUOCN).

 

IFUOCN grants award annually to political and religious leaders, as well as public figures for contribution to “strengthening unity of the Orthodox Christian nations.”

 

Awarding ceremony will be held in Moscow’s Christ the Saviour Cathedral on January 21.

 

“A meeting of the Georgian Patriarch and the Russian Patriarch [Kirill] with President Vladimir Putin is scheduled for January 23,” archpriest Giorgi Zviadadze, a spokesperson for the Georgian Patriarchate, told journalists in Tbilisi on Sunday before the Georgian Church delegation left for Moscow.

 

President Putin congratulated Georgian Orthodox Church leader, who marked his 80th birthday this month and 35th anniversary of enthronement in December, on jubilees and said in a message of congratulation that Patriarch Ilia II’s leadership of the Georgian Orthodox Church was “exemplary” and his contribution to strengthening of Orthodoxy in Georgia “invaluable.”

 

“We highly appreciate your warm relations with Russia and the Russian Orthodox Church. Your personal efforts, your calls for peace, love, creativity, accord and unity have largely contributed to maintaining multi-century ties of friendship and mutual understanding between our peoples during difficult stages of history,” Putin said in his message. “I am sure that fruitful spiritual, cultural, humanitarian dialogue will become a reliable foundation for further development of relations between Russia and Georgia.”

 

Mikhail Shvydkoy, the Russian President’s special envoy for international cultural relations, conveyed Putin’s congratulation during his visit to Tbilisi on January 11 when he attended in the Georgian capital events marking Patriarch Ilia II’s birthday and enthronement anniversaries.

Monk's search for solitude on Georgia hilltop VIDEO