Church of the Dormition (Greek Orthodox Archdiocese),111 St Andrews Rd,11968,Southampton,NY,US
A St. Vladimir’s Seminary’s select choir—made up of students, alumni, student spouses, and community members and led by Robin Freeman, director of Music at SVOTS—will be singing Divine Liturgy at the Church of the Dormition (Greek Orthodox Archdiocese) in Southampton, NY on Sunday, November 6, 2016, at 10 a.m.
The Very Reverend Dr. Alexander Rentel, the John and Paraskeva Skvir Lecturer in Practical Theology at the Seminary, will be accompanying the choir and concelebrating with Protopresbyter Alexander Kartloutsos, rector of the parish.
When “Mama Maggie” Gobran spoke Friday evening, October 22, on our seminary campus, she not only shared the wisdom of the gospel—she embodied it. Through the extraordinary witness of her own life, which is lived among destitute people in Cairo, Egypt’s teeming slums, she humbly but liberally shared the spiritual treasures she has discovered in her service to Jesus Christ.
“When I was young, I had a dream of what life was all about: I thought that the purpose of life was to be happy,” she began, “but when I grew up, I found out that life is giving, the art of giving.”
In 1997 Mama Maggie gave up her career as a professor of Computer Science at the American University in Cairo to found Stephen’s Children, a charity named after the first Christian martyr. The organization uses a holistic approach to meet the physical, spiritual, and practical needs of the poor by opening schools and camps for children, holding literacy classes for women, providing medical services, and offering job training for the unemployed.
In recognition of her work, Mama Maggie, who is a Coptic Christian and who has been called the “Mother Teresa of Cairo,” was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2012. Most recently, in 2015, her work again received international acclaim when major media reported that 7 out of the 21 Coptic Christians beheaded by ISIS were former students of Mama Maggie, once children, whom she had known by name and taught.
In spite of the terror, danger, and daily challenges associated with her ministry, Mama Maggie encouraged her audience to remain close to Jesus Christ and to remember his transformative power, by saying, “Don’t allow the world to shape your life; let your life shape the world around you.”
St. Vladimir's Seminary,575 Scarsdale Rd.,10707,Yonkers,NY,US
A business woman and college professor, a wife, mother and grandmother, and a Coptic Orthodox Christian, Maggie Gobran has devoted herself to rescuing Christians—children above all–who are forced to live in the garbage slums of Cairo, Egypt.
Known as “Mama Maggie” by the numberless people she has helped, she epitomizes Christian witness in a Muslim culture and country. Although Maggie Gobran has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, she is virtually unknown in America.
Now is your chance to meet her! Join us Friday, October 21, 2016, 7:30 pm in the Metropolitan Philip Auditorium of the John G. Rangos Family Building on our campus.
His Grace the Right Reverend Irinej (Dobrijevic), a graduate of both St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary (M.Div. ’82) and St. Tikhon’s Orthodox Theological Seminary, was enthroned as bishop of the Eastern American Diocese of the Serbian Orthodox Church on Saturday, October 1, 2016, at Holy Trinity Serbian Orthodox Cathedral, Pittsburgh. Formerly, His Grace was bishop of the Metropolitanate of Australia and New Zealand, a diocese that, like the diocese to which he is newly elected, is under the authority of the Serbian Orthodox Patriarchate.
During his Enthronement homily, His Grace encouraged his new flock to “consciously strive together for a life in Christ,” adding:
"For He first loved us, creating us as an extension of Himself—His Love—in this world and in this age. But this world, the holy ground on which we stand, which the Lord has created and sealed with His love and beauty (cf. Gen. 1:31), requires us to cooperate fully with the Triumphant God-Man so that we can joyfully enter the abode of God and be His people and that He would be with us and we would live according to the will of our Heavenly Father."
On Sunday, October 2, Archpriest John Behr, dean of St. Vladimir’s Seminary, and Archpriest Alexander Rentel, the Seminary’s John and Paraskeva Skvir Lecturer in Practical Theology, celebrated with His Grace, as he presided at his first Divine Liturgy in New York City in his new capacity.
After the Liturgy, which was held in Madison Square Park, His Grace, celebrating clergy, and accompanying congregants walked in procession to the site of St. Sava Serbian Orthodox Cathedral, where Bishop Irinej presided at a Molieben and blessed the four corners of the cathedral. A devastating fire gutted the cathedral in June 2016, and therefore necessitated His Grace’s Enthronement in Pittsburgh on Saturday, instead of in his home cathedral in New York.
Presentations from Orthodox Education Day, our Seminary’s annual open house, this year held October 1, 2016, are being made available on the website of Ancient Faith Ministries. All presentations center on the day’s theme, “Celebrating Mary,” and included among them is the Fourth Annual Father John Meyendorff Lecture, given by Dr. Mary B. Cunningham.
Dr. Cunningham delivered her lecture, entitled, “The Mystery of Mary: The Mother of God in Orthodox Christian Tradition,” to a capacity crowd in the Seminary’s Metropolitan Philip Auditorium. She spoke with both scholarly precision and devoted warmth about the person of the Virgin Mary, while endeavoring to reconcile for listeners the narrative and typological strands within Orthodox Christian tradition that create a tension: on the one hand, they describe a humble teenager of third-century B.C. Galilee, and on the other hand, they highly elevate a woman to queen-like dignity through magnificent liturgical epitaphs.
Dr. Cunningham resolved the seeming tension by explaining the Virgin Mother’s place in salvation history, in which her personal story (with noticeable historical “gaps”) is subsumed within Christological events. Quoting St. Andrew of Crete’s Homily on the Dormition, Dr. Cunningham summed up: “She is the great world in miniature, the world containing him who brought the world from nothingness into being, that it might be a messenger of his own greatness.”
Other recorded presentations included: “Imagining the Akathistos Hymn in Late Byzantine Art,” by Nicole Paxton Sullo, Ph.D. Candidate, History of Art Department, Yale University; and “The Hope of the Hopeless: The HOPE Project,” a talk given by the Sisters of All Saints Greek Orthodox Monastery, Long Island, NY, about providing resources and healing for victims of human trafficking.
Additionally, alumna Jenny Haddad Mosher, Ph.D. Candidate, Religion and Education, Union Theological Seminary, presented a lively Teen Workshop, entitled, “O Champion Leader: The Teenage Girl Who Changed the World.”
“We are especially gratified,” said seminary CEO Archpriest Chad Hatfield, “that our friends and alumni came out to Ed Day this year, not only to hear the excellent talks by our superb speakers but also to support us during a trying time.
“Because we wanted to recognize and pay due respect to our neighbors during a local tragedy—the line-of-duty death of a brave firefighter—we had decided to completely reorganize our day’s schedule at the last moment,” he explained. “Yet our supporters still came out, thus honoring our intent toward our neighbors while making our event truly successful; it was a wonderful gathering of God’s people.
“And,” he concluded, “We wanted to ‘pay forward’ their kindness, so we decided spontaneously to tithe whatever net profit we receive from this year’s Ed Day to The HOPE Project, run by the Sisters at All Saints Monastery in Long Island. Truly, we who gathered on Ed Day felt like one family under the Virgin’s protection.”
Orthodox Education Day, the annual open house of St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary, will begin at 2:30 p.m. on Saturday, October 1. The events of the day have been moved forward into the afternoon and evening, out of respect for a neighborhood fireman who was killed in the line of duty on Tuesday morning, September 27, during an explosion in the Bronx.
Battalion Chief Michael Fahy, of Battalion 19, died when he was struck by debris from the blast. He was a 17-year veteran of the FDNY, joining in 1999. Chief Fahy lived with his wife and three children in Crestwood, the section of Yonkers that also encompasses the Seminary property. His funeral, which will take place on October 1, at Annunciation-Our Lady of Fatima Parish just one block from the Seminary, is expected to draw up to 10,000 mourners, including firefighters from around the globe.
“Our hearts and prayers go out to Chief Fahy’s family at this time,” said Archpriest Chad Hatfield, CEO of the Seminary.
“We would not want our festivities and the crowds associated with our own Orthodox Education Day in any way to place an extra burden on them as they mourn their beloved husband and father, and as their friends and family, and fellow firefighters, gather to be with them,” he explained. “Therefore, we are readjusting our Ed Day schedule to accommodate them, as we cooperate with local authorities who are coordinating the funeral preparations for Chief Fahy.
“We will light a vigil candle for the Fahy family on that day in our own Three Hierarchs Chapel, and will keep them in prayer,” he added. “May our Lord Jesus Christ be their strength and comfort.”
“Finally,” said Fr. Chad, “We have been assured by local authorities that our Ed Day visitors will be welcome in the neighborhood by 2:30 p.m., and we hope they still will loyally support the Seminary by coming onto campus and enjoying the afternoon and evening with us.”
(NOTE: In case you arrive earlier than 2 p.m. to the Yonkers/Crestwood area, please proceed to the Seminary via Central Park Avenue on to Alta Vista Drive. Then turn left on to Avondale Road, right on on to Pietro Drive, and then turn right on to Maria Lane. The Seminary entrance will be on the left hand side. Local authorities advise this would be the fastest route earlier in the day.)
Highly influential global scholars and artists took seriously the task of “Rethinking Sacred Arts” at a weekend symposium entitled the same and held on our seminary campus September 16–18, 2016. Participants drew from their respective disciplines and expertise in exploring both historic categories and new ways of thinking about “sacrality” and “art.”
The symposium, which included a public Panel Discussion on Saturday evening attended by an audience of 75 people, was the first in a series of events planned between Fall 2016 and Spring 2018 by the Seminary, all of which are a part of its Sacred Arts Initiative (SAI) funded by a grant from the Henry Luce Foundation. Peter C. Bouteneff, professor of Systematic Theology at the Seminary and director of the SAI, coordinated the symposium, along with Dn. Evan Freeman, seminary alumnus and Ph.D. candidate in the Department of the History of Art at Yale University, Richard Schneider, professor of Iconology and Hermeneutics at the Seminary, and Megan Carlisle Rakowski, a trained archivist and seminary alumna.
“In thinking freshly about what it means to call something ‘sacred,’” noted Dr. Bouteneff, “our symposium participants reflected on the dialogical relationship between God and the human person. It is in the human response to God that we create and partake in objects, spaces, words, and sounds that bring us to the encounter with and praise of God.
“Our symposiasts also spoke appreciatively of the unique contribution that the Orthodox world can offer in reflecting theologically on the material world, on human creativity, and on the coming together of the sacred arts in the context of the Liturgy,” he noted. “Their participation in our chapel services made a great impression on them in that regard.”
Among the prestigious participants, three were within the Orthodox Christian tradition: sacred music composer Fr. Ivan Moody, chairman of the International Society for Orthodox Church Music and currently a researcher at CESEM-Universidade Nova de Lisboa; Vasileios Marinis, associate professor of Christian Art and Architecture at the Yale Institute of Sacred Music and Divinity School; and George Kordis, iconographer and former professor in Iconography (Theory and Practice) at the University of Athens.
Other participants represented a wide spectrum of confessional beliefs and disciplines and included: Gordon Graham, Henry Luce III Professor of Philosophy and the Arts, Princeton Theological Seminary; Helen C. Evans, Mary and Michael Jaharis Curator for Byzantine Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art; Annemarie Weyl Carr, University Distinguished Professor of Art History, Southern Methodist University (Emerita); Peter Jeffery, Michael P. Grace Chair in Medieval Studies and Professor of Musicology and Ethnomusicology, Notre Dame University; Margot Fassler, Keough-Hesburgh Professor of Music and Liturgy, University of Notre Dame; Judith Wolfe, senior lecturer in Theology and the Arts, University of St. Andrews, Scotland; and Mary Carruthers, professor of English, New York University (Emerita) and Quondam Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford.
The next SAI event will be an international conference entitled, “Sounding the Sacred,” May 1–4, 2017, which will continue the work of the Arvo Pärt Project at St. Vladimir’s Seminary.
The Amsterdam Center for Orthodox Theology (ACOT) has announced that the Executive Board of Vrije Universiteit (VU) on September 1, 2016, appointed the Very Reverend Dr. John Behr, dean of St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary (SVOTS) and professor of Patristics, to its newly established Metropolitan Kallistos Chair of Orthodox Theology. In this part-time position, Fr. John will visit Amsterdam and work at VU a number of times each year, as he continues his work at St. Vladimir’s Seminary. As a professor at VU, Fr John will also be able to supervise doctoral students.
Father Michael Bakker, director of ACOT, commented on Fr. John’s credentials and teaching gifts, saying, “Besides excellent academic qualifications, Father John Behr brings with him great experience in educating students of diverse backgrounds in an international context. Our students will serve their communities in a pluriform society, and they need to be able to reflect critically on their own faith.
“We have calculated that The Netherlands has about 190 thousand inhabitants with an Orthodox background,” continued Fr. Michael. “Approximately 55 thousand of them belong to the Oriental Orthodox family, for example, Armenians, Copts, Ethiopians.
“In 2015,” Fr. Michael further explained, “the Dutch Minister of Education decided to grant VU a special budget to educate clergy for these growing churches. At the time of Fr. John’s inaugural lecture at VU on Friday, January 13, 2017, details will be provided about ACOT’s Orthodox programs.”
Professor Wim Janse, dean of the Faculty of Theology at ACOT, added, “A full and dedicated chair in Orthodox theology broadens and enriches our academic horizon.”
Father John received his doctorate in 1995 from the University of Oxford after being supervised by Metropolitan Kallistos Ware. His doctoral work, which examined issues of asceticism and anthropology, focused on Ss. Irenaeus of Lyons and Clement of Alexandria and was published by Oxford University Press (OUP). Father John also founded the Formation of Christian Theology series at St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press (SVS Press), which includes his books The Way to Nicaea and The Nicene Faith; his subsequent book The Mystery of Christ: Life in Death synthesized those studies. More recently Fr. John published a poetic, meditative work entitled Becoming Human: Theological Anthropology in Word and Image, and also a full study of St. Irenaeus: St. Irenaeus of Lyons: Identifying Christianity. He has completed a new edition and translation of Origen’s On First Principles (OUP, 2017), and he currently is working on a new edition and translation of the works of St. Irenaeus of Lyon and on a book on the Gospel of St John.
