Organization of the orthodoxe Church in Greece

Except the patriarch of Constantinople, the archbishop of Athens and the archbishop of Crete, all the bishop S which have the load of a diocese on the territory of the Greece carry the title of métropolite and are of equal dignity. It is the seniority in the episcopate which establishes precedences. Thus all the cathedrals are called metropolises.

The Hellenic Republic inherited its history a singularly complex organization of the orthodoxe Église on its territory.

Of IVe at the 8th century of the Christian history, already, two patriarchates divided the territory of current Greece, that of Rome extended on the Western part and continental country and that of Constantinople on the Eastern Islands and the Thrace.

Today still, two orthodoxe Churches autocéphales divide this territory, the Patriarcat of Constantinople and the Église of Greece.

But this division is a little complicated so that it is necessary in makes distinguish six ecclesiastical territories from sizes and extremely different statutes.

The Church of Greece

It was founded in 1833 on the South-western quarter of the country then released of the Othoman yoke. She was recognized by the Patriarchate of Constantinople in 1850. She carries on her pastoral activity on the following territory: the Attic, the Peloponnese, the Cyclades, the Eubée and the Sporades of North, the Étolie, the Acarnanie, the Béotie, the Évritanie the Phthiotide, the Thessalie (except the metropolis of Élasson), the Ionian Islands and the metropolis of Arta (in Épire). The Church of Greece counts an archbishop's palace and 42 metropolises.

The Church of Crete

It is an semi-autonomous Church within the patriarchate of Constantinople. It kept its statute when the Crete obtained its autonomy in 1898 and then its fastening in Greece in 1913. The Church of Crete includes/understands, the archbishop's palace whose seat is with Héraklion, and seven metropolises.

" The Terres" News;

They were released from the Othoman supervision in 1912, following the third war of Balkans. The metropolises remained in the obedience of the patriarchate of Constantinople but the patriarch authorized them to take part in work of the synod of the Church of Greece. They include/understand the following territories:

the Macedonia,
the metropolis of Élasson (in Thessalie),
the Épire (except the metropolis of Arta), the Thrace and islands of Lemnos, Lesbos, Tap-hole, Samos and Icarie.

The Holy Mountain (or the Athos mount)

It is one names particular whose statutes are guaranteed in international law by the Traité of Lausanne (1923). The territory is distributed by it between twenty monasteries Stavropigiaque S (i.e. free) which, for this reason, do not have an other bishop only the patriarch of Constantinople. See monastic Republic of the Mount Athos.

Four metropolises of the Dodécanèse

They were attached to Greece in 1946. They kept their statute of metropolises of the primitive territory of the patriarchate of Constantinople.

Patriarchal Exarchat of Patmos

It recovers the four islands of Patmos (l'" Sainte" island;), Lipsi, Agathonisi and Arki. It owes to its special statute with the Monastère Midsummer's Day the Theologist builds on the cave of the Apocalypse. The patriarch of Constantinople is the titular bishop there. He names a cathigoumene (bishop-abbot) which assumes on its behalf the double load of superior of the monastery and bishop of the small archipelago. When the four islands became Greek in 1946, with the whole of the Dodécanèse, this particular status was maintained and confirmed by the law 1155-81 of the Greek State.

The flag of the orthodoxe Church in Greece

It is used on the buildings of évêchés, the metropolises, the monasteries and sometimes on the churches the employers' feastday. It is a memory of the Byzantine empire in its ideal of gathering and civilization. The eagle with the éployées wings represents the universality (or oecumenism) of the East in the Occident. In the orthodoxe Church, the eagle is an emblem of the bishop.

The exarchats and métochions them

In accordance with the use of the orthodoxe Church, some monastic churches and some houses derogate from the territorial organization presented above. They are the exarchats, representation in Greece of the various orthodoxe patriarchates, and métochions them (dependences) of a monastery. These two institutions enjoy a kind of extraterritoriality. At the time of the eucharistic liturgy, one does not mention the bishop of the place there, according to the general use, but the primacy of the Church represented or the bishop responsible for the monastery, according to the statute of exception of the representation.

There is in Athens:

a exarchat of the Holy Sepulchre (Patriarchate of Jerusalem) in the district of Plaka.
a métochion of the Monastery Holy-Catherine of the Sinai in the district of Ambélokipi.
a métochion of the Monastery of Simonopetra (in Athos) in the suburbs of Byron, the church of the Rise.

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