November 25, 2014
The Patriarch of Antioch, Patriarch John X, will come from Damascus, Syria, to enthrone Metropolitan Joseph as new head of the Antiochian Orthodox Church in North America.
The enthronement will take place Sat. Dec. 6 at 4:30 p.m. at the Church’s St. Nicholas Cathedral in Brooklyn, NY.
Metropolitan Joseph was selected by the Holy Synod of Antioch on July 3 to succeed Metropolitan Philip, who died March 19. Metropolitan Joseph was formerly the Bishop of the Diocese of Los Angeles and the West.
He now heads the entire Antiochian Orthodox Church in America, with nine bishops, over 400 clergy, and 266 parishes and missions throughout the United States and Canada.
The Antiochian Orthodox Church worldwide is headed by the Patriarch of Antioch John X and is the largest Arab Christian church in the world, with churches in the Middle East, Europe, North and South America and Australia. It was founded by Ss. Paul and Barnabas in 42 A.D. and its first bishop was St .Peter the Apostle, who later went on to be Bishop of Rome.
The Bible states in Acts 11:26 “And the disciples were first called Christians in Antioch.”
The Patriarchate is one of the four ancient Patriarchates within the Orthodox Church today – the others being the Patriarchates of Jerusalem, Alexandria (Egypt) and Constantinople (Istanbul, Turkey).
The Orthodox Church is the second largest Christian Church in the world with over 250 million adherents.
