Приход Русской Православной Церкви в России и за рубежом. Материалы к изучению приходской жизни. Выпуск 5. Православные приходы греческого мира (Греция, Кипр). Место и роль русскоязычных общин - стр. 4

The fifth collection is dedicated to parish materials collected largely in orthodox communities of Greece and Cyprus. As distinct from previous years when we took interest in the particularities of the social fife of Russian-speaking orthodox communities being in place and existing in multi-religious environment or environment of other religion, for example, in such countries as Germany and USA, the collection of this year is dedicated to the fife history of parishes within countries of orthodox tradition. We were mainly concerned about answers to the following questions: what’s the place and role of Russian-speaking orthodox parishes in the church medium of orthodox communities of Cyprus and Greece, how do they interact, what relations, actors are used in this regard, are there problem areas of that interaction, what’s their nature, how do extra-liturgic activities and social functioning of Cyprian and Greek Orthodox Churches take place, how do they incorporate Russian-speaking parishes. In this regard we interviewed metropolitans of Cyprian and Greek Orthodox Churches, which eparchies incorporate Russian-speaking orthodox communities and which policy aims at supporting and strengthening such relations, as well as priests, clerics, churchgoers of Russian-speaking parishes, particularly, their volunteers who make a major contribution to the social fife of their communities.

As a result, the first part Parish in the Reviews of Hierarchs of Cyprian and Greek Orthodox Churches of the collection features interviews of the Metropolitan of Limassol Athanasios (Nicolaou) who paid particular attention to relation of clearly-defined territorial borders of parishes of Cyprus to effectiveness of social service to the Church; the Metropolitan of Tamassos and Orinis Isaiah (Kykkotis) who created the multibranch network of extra liturgic activities in his eparchy covering all kinds of social groups; the Metropolitan of Morphou and Soloi Neophytos (Masouras) who serve within occupied territories of Cyprus; and the Metropolitan of Trimithous Varnavas who shared his experience of managing parish communal life in the working class area of Greek Thessaloniki.

The second part Orthodox Parish in Cyprus and Greece: a Parish Priest’s View of the collection begins with the interview of two Greek priests wellknown in Greece with their missionary and social work. This is an interview of hereditary archpriest Konstantin Vletsis speaking about changes taking place in the education of priests in modern Greece due to transition of the best part of parishes to cities and particularities of modern parish life in this respect; and archpriest Vasilios Kalliakmanis, the parish abbot, who have been arranging free meals for the poor for many years, reveals in his interview conditions for creating close-knit communities. Further the priest Georgy Vidyakin’s interview follows this part of the collection. Georgy Vidyakin is a current abbot of the first Russian-speaking parish of Cyprus, who tells about history of its establishing, difficulties and particularities of organizing the parish fife in Cyprus; archimandrite Augustin (Karras) who describes the parish fife under conditions of occupation and fashionable tourism of Aya Napa; priest Alexey Avsievich, the superior of Russian-speaking seasonal communities; priest Sergey Kozlov who serves in a village parish; and archimandrite Ambrose (Gorelov) who currently makes every effort to organize Russian monkery in Cyprus.