www.byzcath.org Forums News & Events Church News Episcopal Consecration of His Grace Alexis of Mexico City

Good and Happy news!

From now on, the Apostolic Orthodox Church of Mexico (legal denomination of the Mexican Exarchate - OCA) has its own Bishop.

The Episcopal consecration took place at St. Tikhon's Russian Orthodox Monastery in Pensilvania, and was performed by His Beautitude Herman, Metropolitan of Canada and All America.

For several years, the new Bishop, His Grace Alexis, had been archimandrite of Ascension Monastery, the headquarters of the Apostolic Orthodox Church in Mexico, until last month when by the request of the Right Reverent Dmitri of Dallas, the Holy Synod of the Orthodox Church in America decided that it was time for Orthodox Mexicans to have their own bishop.

The Apostolic Orthodox Church is currently the largest Orthodox denomination of the country and claims to have 30,000 faithful located mainly in Mexico City and the nearby suburbs.

The enthrownment of Bishop Alexis will take place at the Ascension Cathedral in Mexico City and will be attended by clergy of the Greek and Antiochian Orthodox Churches, as well as the Archbishop of Mexico City, Mexico City's governour and representatives of the National Government.

(source 29 may 05)

You can find the pictures of the consecration here:

http://www.stots.edu/news_050528_1.html

God grant to your Grace Alexis of Mexico City many years of peace, health, and happiness.

Congratulations to Mexico.

Many years to new Bishop Alejo.

By the way don't you think answer from the Primate Catholic Bishop Norberto Rivera (Mexico City) is very Christian in attending consecration of an OCA Bishop for a Catholic country. Very different indeed from answer to late Pope JP II from ROC.

Indeed.

However, I'd like to point out that the Orthodox Christians in Mexico ALREADY HAD a well established local hierarchy from the Patriarchate of Antioch.

In addition to this, Mexico is also part of the Central American Metropolis under the Ecumenical Patriarch.

So, this constitutes not only the creation of an Orthodox jurisdiction in a territory which is canonically Roman Catholic, but also an establishment of overlapping Orthodox jurisdictions.

I wonder if the decision was a wise one.

In any event, I do hope the new Eparch would move to national territory. I know my Orthodox brethren have a hard time dealing with change, but Dallas ceased to be in Mexican territory QUITE A WHILE ago.

Shalom,
Memo

Dear Memo,

You tell 'em!

Remember the Alamo!

(Great deals on rental cars, by the way . . .)

Alex

Christ is Risen!
The making of a diocese for Mexico by the OCA does not increase the number of overlapping Orthodox jurisdictions; rather, it means that OCA parishes in mexico are no longer under a foreign bishop.
That aside, the Russian Church (of which the OCA is a daughter church) had a bishop of all America well before there were overlapping jurisdictions in America; 100 years ago, Mexico was uncontestedly part of the Church of Russia, which part was broken off as the OCA.
Every Orthodox country has a Roman Catholic Hierarchy present, and most sizeable Roman Cathic countries have some Orthodox hierarchy present.
So, what's your point?

Photius

I think what Memo meant to infer was that in light of Bishop Alexis' elevation demands made of Rome to collapse Roman Catholic hierarchies outside of its immediate canonical territory seem unreasonable. Though I would agree, I think its somewhat redundant to argue the point since not one of us here makes the policy for either the Church of Rome or the Orthodox.

Memo:

Please check your facts before making allegations and innuendo.

A few clarifications are in order:

This is not a new diocese. The Mexican National Catholic Church, which had broken from the Roman Catholic Church (I believe at the time of the Mexican Revolution), became part of the OCA in 1972 when the the Mexican National Catholic Church converted en masse to Orthodoxy under the man who was to become their Bishop Jose. http://www.st-george-pharr-tx.org/mexico.htm

Bishop Jose fell asleep in the Lord unexpectedly quite some time ago and Archbishop Dimitri became the Exarch and Bishop (then Archimandrite) Alejo the Administrator.

I believe that His Eminence Dimitri became the acting Exarch as there were no, at that time, any eligible candidates.

This was not creating any new anything. I can only assume that the OCA was petitioned as the Mexican Church did not want to conduct services in Greek, Arabic or a combination of both.

Were the Antiochian or Ecumenical Patriarch diosesan structures in place at the time of the Mexican Revolution?

Many years to His Grace Bishop Alexis!

We have at last count 5 bishops representing true Apostolic churches here in Pgh. This news from Mexico is better than hearing we lost another how many? faithful to the Pentecostals or Charismatics or whatever.

Bill

Dear Hector,

Rome will deal with Church politics where it has to and with charity throughout the rest of the world. If I may be so bold, at this point I will stand up and say "I am not in error or a heretic".
Let's get the Church back together.

With that my son has a baseball game and I have to bail.

Bill

Orthodox Christians in Mexico ALREADY HAD a well established local hierarchy from the Patriarchate of Antioch.

Well, the Syrian-Antiochian Orthodox Church has a "Metropolitanate for Mexico and Central America", but it's still a foreign Church. Their priests and faithful are almost entirely descendents of Lebanese and Arab people.

In addition to this, Mexico is also part of the Central American Metropolis under the Ecumenical Patriarch.

The Greek Orthodox Church had a great development under Bishop Paul de Ballester who translated liturgical texts in Spanish. After his assesination, Mons. Evangelos Kasameotes (a former US Army officer) dismanteled the work of his predecessor. The see of the diocese itself was then moved to Panama and since then, they have sent Latin-American (neither Mexican nor Greek) priests who have greatly dissapointed the faithful.

Most have joined the Exarchate of Mexico that also follows Greek-Byzantine tradition and whose monks are a gift for so many Christians as they're incredible pastors and a moral authority.

So, this constitutes not only the creation of an Orthodox jurisdiction in a territory which is canonically Roman Catholic...

The Greek and Antiochian Dioceses were orginaly destined for the Greek-Orthodox and Arab faithful. Their bishops do not hold the title "Archbishop of Mexico City". I don't think Bishop Alexis has the intention to take Archbishop Norberto's title either.

But strictly speaking in "Orthodox terms" the Roman Catholic hierarchy in schism is not the Church, the Orthodox Church has the right to establish a hierarchy in Mexico, the EP in particular, because it has jurisdiction on "barbarian lands".

The Catholic Church, before it became Ecumenicist, also believed that heretics or schismatics simply lost their jurisdiction. That's why there are Catholic Patriarchs in Antioch for example, as the Monophysite Patriarchs are heretical and the Orthodox-Greek ones who were meant to replace them, had gone into schism.

The Mexican National Catholic Church, which had broken from the Roman Catholic Church (I believe at the time of the Mexican Revolution)

The history of this Church is quite confusing. Communism organized a deep persecution against religion for several decades, in 1928 there was (like in Russia) the attempt to replace the RC with a "living church" (services in spanish, civil marriage, etc). The government bought holy orders from an American "Old-Catholic" Bishop Henry Carfora for Joaquin Perez, a masonic priest.

When the Roman Catholic hierarchy betrayed the Christian armies and in fact adopted the "living church" programme (loyalty to the Pope would be only spiritual but had no authority officialy speaking, etc); there was no need for the living church so Perez and his followers reconciled with Rome.

It's my understanding that Bishop Jose was part of a National-Catholic-Church of Mexico, an "Old Catholic" denomination like many of the Old Catholic "National" Churches in the USA. Many things can be said about the validity of the orders he received, but he and his church had no relationship with the previous schism AT ALL.

I can only assume that the OCA was petitioned as the Mexican Church did not want to conduct services in Greek, Arabic or a combination of both.

The liturgical appereance of the Exarchate seems more Byzantine-Greek than Russian or Slavic. The clerical vestments of the monks for example, are different from those of the American-Slavonic OCA clergy (check the pictures).

I think they petitioned the MP not because of liturgical preference but becausein the 1970's it would be politicaly easier to join a Church whose main country enjoyed good relations with Mexico's government, than the EP (the AOC was out of question because they're still too ethnic and the Exarchate faithful wouldn't have liked to be seen as Arabs or Lebanese).

It was made an Exarchate of the OCA, I believe, when the American Metropolia separated from the ROCOR hierarchy and recognized the MP. Just as many ethnic Russian parishes became MP Patriarchal parishes in the USA, the Russian parish in Nepantla-Mexico that was already part of the MP (ROCOR presence was not permitted in Mexico) decided to stay as MP parish, while the Mexican faithful naturaly prefered to be united with the OCA, whose hierarchy was closer and would be able to help more.

... but also an establishment of overlapping Orthodox jurisdictions.

Memo makes a valid point. There are now four jurisdictions and three bishops in Mexico, according to ethnic divisions (MP for Russian-Mexicans, OAC for Mexicans, AOC for Arabs and EP for non-Mexican Hispanics). This is phyletism and opposed to unity.

However, the Exarchate will become a very strong Church in the future. Even though there some details of the OCA practice that we might disagree (veneration of saints as Blessed Peter the Aleut for example) I think it's possitive to support it.

Maybe someday it will become under the EP again, who knows.

Mexican,

Interesting post. Could you elaborate on your final point, specifically the reference to Blessed Peter the Aleut? I don't quite understand where the disagreement would be.

Thanks!

Many years,

Gordo

Having a break away from the rigors of baseball games and practices, may I pick the minds of my Eastern brothers and sisters here?

I wrote in a post above, "I am not in error or a heretic". My point being I truly do not believe the Catholic and Orthodox churches are separated so much over matters of faith as they are over semantics and politics, although I know there are those who will argue this until well after the cows come home. Polemics such as papal authority and the filioque aside,( which I think the average layman, Catholic or Orthodox, would point to as the basic reasons for why we remain separated), I believe local church authority is a main bone of contention.

As I stated before we have five bishops here in Pittsburgh; Roman Catholic, Byzantine Catholic, Greek Orthodox, OCA and Antiochian Orthodox. Let's say the Catholic and Orthodox churches did come to a final agreement to reunite. (I know, wishful thinking.) Would you see anything wrong with the situation here in Pittsburgh of having five bishops? My argument is now, and would be if this union would take place, that each of these bishops has a different and unique congregation to pastor. I don't see any reason why a city or an area with different ethnic identities, which also means different cultural and liturgical practices (as is the case right now in the Eastern Churches), can not be served by more than one bishop when each can tend the needs of his particular church most effectively. Am I making any sense in what I am trying to say?

Bill

Bill,

You may want to consider Parma, OH, where there are two Catholic Bishops of the Byzantine rite, one Ruthenian and one Ukrainian. Multiplicity of bishops happens in other places too.

The Antiochian bishop in Pittsburgh is new, I am told he is given the title, or at least being referred to as "of Oakland." Some were laughing at that.

Tony

And some find it very convenient that if some difficulty arises between them and their bishop, they can hop over to some other one. Others find this practice to be a terrible thing.