WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 19th July, 2022) More than a thousand members of the Orthodox Church in America (OCA) gathered in Baltimore, Maryland, to start the church's five-day All-American Council, the Baltimore Sun reported.
OCA clergy, parishioners and officials met at the Hilton Baltimore Inner Harbor to participate in the 20th iteration of the event, the report said on Monday.
Attendees will address issues such as the election of new officials, the shortage of priests and pension plans, among others, OCA Chancellor Alexander Rentel said.
Approximately one-fifth of the OCA parishes lack a full-time priest, Rentel also said. Delegates to the conference will discuss solutions including bolstering the involvement of young people in the church, the report said.
The All-American Council was postponed from July 2021 to July 2022 due to the coronavirus pandemic and the theme of the event was changed from the original "Hope in an Age of Despair" to "Becoming vessels of Grace," the report said.
Most people in the United States lived the former theme while dealing with the pandemic, so the theme was altered to reflect on the need for OCA clergy and believers alike to commit to the church's mission and be good representatives of it, Metropolitan Tikhon said during a virtual talk last year.
Rentel said Baltimore was chosen as a location for the event in part because it is within the Diocese of Washington, DC, the archbishop of which is Metropolitan Tikhon.
The Russian Orthodox Church granted a tomos of autocephaly, or decree of independence, to the OCA in April 1970, following decades of unsuccessful attempts of reconciliation after the Bolshevik revolution in 1917.
The OCA has its origins in a mission established by Russian monks in Alaska and currently consists of more than 700 parishes, monasteries and communities in the United States, Canada and Mexico.
