{"id":7131,"date":"2012-01-25T12:33:40","date_gmt":"2012-01-25T20:33:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/?p=7131"},"modified":"2012-01-28T12:41:39","modified_gmt":"2012-01-28T20:41:39","slug":"orthodox-christians-take-high-visibility-role-in-the-march-for-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/2012\/01\/orthodox-christians-take-high-visibility-role-in-the-march-for-life\/","title":{"rendered":"Orthodox Christians Take High-Visibility Role in the March for Life"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Orthodox by The Editors –
\nAt a religious event often dominated by massive presence of Roman Catholics, members of the Eastern Orthodox Church played a more visible role in this year\u2019s March for Life than ever before. For the first time, the opening prayer in front of the Supreme Court was offered by His Eminence Jonah (Paffhausen), Metropolitan of All America and Canada for the Orthodox Church in America (OCA), as well as Roman Catholic prelates Daniel Cardinal DiNardo and Cardinal-designate Timothy Dolan.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are of one heart and one purpose,\u201d he said as he chanted a litany of life before hundreds of thousands of marchers.<\/p>\n

The Metropolitan was joined by several of his brother bishops, including Bp. Melchizedek of Pittsburgh, Bp. Matthias of Chicago, and Bp. Michael of New York. At least 15 priests were in his company alone. Several individual representatives of the Carpatho-Russian Orthodox, Greek Orthodox, and Antiochian Orthodox Churches also participated. <\/p>\n

Fr. Chad Hatfield, chancellor of St. Vladimir Orthodox Theological Seminary in Syosset, New York, estimated more than 100 Orthodox Christians came with his group. St. Tikhon\u2019s Seminary in Pennsylvania also brought students to participate in the church\u2019s public ministry.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe nation should respect life from conception until the moment the person naturally takes his last breath,\u201d Met. Jonah told LifeSiteNews.com. The Orthodox Christian Church, the world\u2019s second largest Christian denomination, dogmatically teaches that life begins at conception and that abortion is a grave sin.<\/p>\n

He said throughout the year the faithful should remind women who have had an abortion \u201cthat forgiveness and healing are available to them. They should support ministries that care for pregnant women by, for instance, founding crisis pregnancy centers. That is the kind of ministry that will bring an end to abortion in this nation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

He instructed parishes of the OCA to insert prayers for the end of abortion into one of the church\u2019s litanies on January 22, which the OCA proclaimed \u201cSanctity of Human Life Sunday.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fr. Chad Hatfield told LifeSiteNews.com said he had only one disappointment. \u201cI hope next year we have a greater participation from other Orthodox jurisdictions,\u201d he said, particularly other bishops.<\/p>\n

Some churches refused to participate on the grounds that the March for Life is a political event. But one Orthodox Christian at the march told LifeSiteNews, \u201cIt is not political; it is a religious testament to our faith. We say the same things to Republicans as we do to Democrats.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Eastern Church has been active in the pro-life movement for decades. Archpriest John Kowalczyk, the co-founder of the Orthodox Presence at the March for Life, said in a statement, \u201cFor over 25 years, Orthodox Christians from throughout the country have gathered in the nation\u2019s capital to show their dismay for the millions of children who have been aborted since the infamous decision of Roe v. Wade. This March for Life Movement has united many Christians of all denominations on the principle, of what Saint Gregory of Nyssa says, \u2018Life begins at conception.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Metropolitan Jonah said he believes pro-life activism and defending the culture of life will increasingly become vehicles for practical cooperation with fellow Christians. In the process, it is bringing the little-known church into national exposure. Fr. Kowalczyk said, \u201cThe Orthodox presence in this March has inspired other Christians to view Orthodoxy not simply as an ethnic identity, but a Church with a moral teaching.\u201d<\/p>\n

Orthodox faithful began Monday\u2019s events by gathering for two prayer services. Eastern Orthodox Christians held a Divine Liturgy and prayer service at St. Nicholas Cathedral on Massachusetts Ave. A Western Rite Orthodox Mass was held at St. Gregory the Great Orthodox Church in metropolitan Washington.<\/p>\n

Members of the Orthodox Church took part in pro-life events far outside the nation\u2019s capital, as well. At the West Coast March for Life, Fr. Aris Metrakos, protopresbyter of San Francisco\u2019s Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church, gave the invocation. \u201cAbortion-on-demand has shredded the moral fabric of our society by encouraging promiscuity, obliterating the notion of personal responsibility and accountability, and making selfishness a legal right,\u201d he said. \u201cIt makes a mockery of men\u2019s honor and the medical profession\u2019s nobility, while exposing the duplicity and opportunism of the majority of the political class.\u201d<\/p>\n

HT: LifeSiteNews<\/a><\/p>\n

\"Orthodox<\/p>\n

\"Orthodox<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by The Editors – At a religious event often dominated by massive presence of Roman Catholics, members of the Eastern Orthodox Church played a more visible role in this year\u2019s March for Life than ever before. For the first time, the opening prayer in front of the Supreme Court was offered by His Eminence Jonah … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":497,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"generate_page_header":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[85,15,5,130,23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7131","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-anti-abortion","category-moral-issues","category-orthodox-christianity","category-orthodox-church","category-sanctity-of-life"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/497"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7131"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7131\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.orthodoxytoday.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}