Orthodox Prelate Concerned Over Use of English

The growing use of English as a primary or exclusive language among Orthodox Christians in the United States has drawn concern from a ranking prelate recently, but some clerics believe the trend is inevitable, even beneficial.

Archbishop Iakovos, primate of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of North and South America, has warned that Greek-Americans are cutting “ourselves off from our historic past” by not drilling their children in the fundamentals of Greek.

But on the positive side, the shift from ethnic languages such as Serbian or Ukrainian to English means that one of the most critical divisions of the ethnic churches is evaporating, opening the door to a united American Orthodox denomination using English.

“Frankly, that’s the future of Orthodoxy in the United States,” said Slavco Taskov of New York, former vice president of the Bulgarian Eastern Orthodox Church. “Since English is the vehicle of communication here, it has to become the primary language of the church.”

Bishop Isaiah of New York, chancellor of the Greek archdiocese, said his church considers the Greek language to be an inextricable link to that country’s faith and culture. Therefore, he said, “Archbishop Iakovos is trying to tell the people in a positive way to perpetuate what was nearly taken away from us in bygone days.”

In a Sept. 1 letter to the faithful marking the start of a new school year, Archbishop Iakovos referred to the 400-year rule of Greece by the Ottoman Empire, when Turkish was the official language. He charged that to abandon Greek now “would be ingratitude on our part, as well as shameful and a callous disregard of history.”

“We are in a stage of transition,” said Father John Yurcisin of Johnstown, Pa., chancellor of the Carpatho-Russian Orthodox Greek Catholic Diocese in America.