Christ is Risen! Truly, He is Risen!
We pray that this newsletter continues to find you and your loved ones well, safe and in good health.
Within the past months, much work has been undertaken by our Department and its partners to create spaces for and lend our own voices to instruction and dialogue. Notably, the “How-to” Green Your Parish video series, now available on YouTube, has so far been a great success in providing a diversity of thoughts from a plethora of authorities on creation care within the Orthodox Church. Our very own Archdeacon John Chryssavgis has contributed two instructive videos on Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew and the sacramentality of creation care respectively. Dr. George Nassos and the community of St. Anna Greek Orthodox Church in Roseville, CA inspired us to think about and implement eco-friendly practices that fulfill the resource needs of parishes while in our most recent episode, Hieromonk Michael provided an eloquent meditation concerning the creation of the parish garden in relation to the Garden of Eden. 

In celebration of the 200th anniversary of Greek independence, the “Faith in Freedom” YouTube series and the webinar entitled, “The Place of the Greek Revolution in Today’s Greek Identity” have led to thought provoking reflections on how inter-faith and national conceptions of freedom are central to our understanding of self and links us to others.
Like always, the above is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the multi-faceted and inter-personal work that the Department undertakes for greater dialogue, harmony, and trust with ecumenical and inter-faith partners and between humanity and the environment.
Happy reading and scrolling!