Fr. John Peck was apparently dealt with in a similarly effective manner by the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese for peering into the future and having the nerve to publish his thoughts.

 

Copernicus and Gallileo said the Earth was round and rotated around the sun.

 

Fr. John Peck says that an Orthodoxy in America based primarily on ethnocentricity is doomed. 

 

Fr. John says that immoral bishops and clergy are bad.

 

He sees a future where one's faith and commitment to genuine Orthodoxy is more important than membership at an ethnic country club.

 

For that he is removed from his parish?

 

Tame stuff by modern standards.  Most non-Orthodox at the Belief Net blog above are amazed that something as innocent as Fr. John's article could get a priest in trouble.  I hope that no Orthodox are surprised; this is so typical of the ossification and paranoia in our church that exists in certain parishes and dioceses in every U.S. jurisdiction.

 

If anyone has looked around at fellow parishioners in their Orthodox church during the past several decades, you'd see the demographic trends.

 

Of course there are more converts, non-Greeks, non-Russians, non-Arabs in American Orthodoxy churches.  Praise God!  (That is a good thing, isn't it Your Eminence?)

 

But where are "our" young people?

 

Last summer's GOA Clergy Laity Conference once again tried to grapple with the inescapable truth of "religious mixed marriages" or people marrying outside of the faith.

 

They have been talking about that for 30 years. 

 

Their answer?  Smash a devoted priest who wants to wake his fellow Orthodox up.

 

And you expect honest, believing Orthodox Christians to believe that Christ would have you do this, in His Name?

 

Please pray for Fr. John Peck.

 

And also for all of the more than 40 unassigned priests in the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese alone, along with their persecuted brothers in the OCA and Antiochian Archdioceses.