Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Eastern Orthodoxy/Archive 2

Use of Orthodox Wiki links in regular Wikipedia

Hi; I just made some fixes on Herman of Alaska, as external links were placed in the body of the article, which is contrary to WP:MOS; two of these were Orthodox Wiki links, but they're still external links and not appropriate; this Wikipedia needs articles on Holy Resurrection Cathedral (Alaska) and Antiochan Village, as there may be other WikiProjects that those articles also are covered by, specifically in those cases WP:Alaska and WP:Antiochan Village. In general, I've noticed that some articles on Orthodox saints and history need quite a bit of work to bring them to WP:MOS and WP:NPOV despite a large amount of effort already put into them. Please be careful of this in future and, when referring to an article in Orthodox Wiki, treat it like an external link like any other link, and create parallel articles in THIS Wikipedia which other editors from other projects can edit and contribute to. BTW the work on the Orthodox Church in Russian America is admirable, but it needs to be brought into Wikipedia standards in such matters.Skookum1 (talk) 02:54, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

Project priorities

Which articles should be the projects top priorities? I would like to see a list of 50-100 Top priority articles. I suggest:

History: Byzantine Empire - Crusades - Ecumenical council - Christianization of Bulgaria - Christianization of Kievan Rus'
East-West Schism

By region: Asian - Copts - Eastern Orthodox - Georgian - Ukrainian

Traditions: Assyrian Church of the East - Eastern Orthodox Church - Eastern Catholic Churches - Oriental Orthodoxy
Syriac Christianity

Liturgy and Worship: Sign of the cross - Divine Liturgy - Iconography - Asceticism - Omophorion

Theology: Hesychasm - Icon- Apophaticism - Filioque clause- Miaphysitism - Monophysitism- Nestorianism - Theosis
Theoria - Phronema - Philokalia - Praxis - Theotokos - Hypostasis - Ousia - Essence-Energies distinction - Metousiosis

Thoughts?? What do we drop? What is missing? -- Secisek (talk) 20:32, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

Referenced historical facts that make Eastern Orthodoxy look bad, especially that expose the specious claim that they've preserved the patterns of worship of the early church (e.g. icons) are deleted and suppressed.

A major council of the church, meeting in Elvira, Spain in the year 305, expressed its shocked disapproval of some churches with just paintings on the walls. Canon 36 of the Council of Elvira states, "Pictures are not to be placed in churches, so that they do not become objects of worship and adoration."Keep in mind that even by this late date they were objecting just to the presence of art in a church; for example, they would object to our stained glass, saying that it had the potential to become idolatrous. There was no hint of actually using images as “aids in worship” or “points of prayer.” About the year 327 the famous early church historian Eusebius, who lived around Jerusalem, received a letter from the emperor’s sister, Constantia, asking him for a picture of Christ. Eusebius wrote her a very stern reply. He knew that such pictures existed in the marketplaces but he didn’t believe that the people who make such things were Christians. He took it for granted that only pagan artists would dream of making such representations. Eusebius. He insisted that even the incarnate Christ cannot appear in an image, for “the flesh which He put on for our sake … was mingled with the glory of His divinity so that the mortal part was swallowed up by Life.” This was the splendour that Christ revealed in the Transfiguration and which cannot be captured in human art. To depict purely the human form of Christ before its transformation, on the other hand, is to break the commandment of God and to fall into pagan error." (David M. Gwynn, From Iconoclasm to Arianism: The Construction of Christian Tradition in the Iconoclast Controversy [Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 47 (2007) 225–251], p. 227.)

Another example is Letter LI. From Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis, in Cyprus, to John, Bishop of Jerusalem (c. 394).

I went in to pray, and found there a curtain hanging on the doors of the said church, dyed and embroidered. It bore an image either of Christ or of one of the saints; I do not rightly remember whose the image was. Seeing this, and being loth that an image of a man should be hung up in Christ's church contrary to the teaching of the Scriptures, I tore it asunder and advised the custodians of the place to use it as a winding sheet for some poor person.

But as more and more people like Constantine and his sister came into the church with little or no Biblical background, they brought more and more pagan customs with them. So that although in 305 a church council (Elvira) vehemently objected to even just art in a church, in less than 100 years portrayals of Christ and the saints were widespread. Drift, drift, drift.

Yet these images of Christ caused pain to those who remembered the older, simpler worship. And many Christians insisted that the use of such images, especially in worship was a blatant violation of the 2nd commandment. So the icons were a source of discontent which emerged in the eighth century (the 700s) as the bitter iconoclastic controversy. This was especially strong in the east, the Greek speaking part of the Roman Empire, the Byzantine Empire. In 726, the emperor Leo started a campaign to eliminate the icons. The controversy lasted for over a century as Christian emperors in Constantinople sought to wipe out the icons. Meanwhile, the western part of the empire had completely collapsed politically. There was no effective political power based in Rome. The bishop of Rome – the Pope – was the major force there. But in the East the emperor was the major force and for a century many of the emperors were in favor of abiding by the 2nd commandment. They believed that the images were idols – which seems to me to be self-evident – and that they were associated with the idolatry Christianity had come to destroy. They believed that the representations of Christ, Mary, and the Apostles, clearly borrowed from pagan idols. And as the well-known church historian Henry Chadwick writes, “In this instinct there was a measure of truth. The representations of Christ as the Almighty Lord on his judgment throne owed something to pictures of Zeus. Portraits of the Mother of God were not wholly independent of a pagan past of venerated mother-goddesses. In the popular mind the saints had come to fill a role that had been played by heroes and deities.” (The Early Church, 283.) So there was a great struggle in the Eastern Church – that church that has evolved into what is the “Eastern Orthodox Church” to this day. For much of a century the icons were prohibited but eventually they were allowed back in, by the Empress Irene. I tell this story, also, in part to debunk the myth that some have that these practices go back to the “earliest Christians,” that their rituals have been faithfully handed down from the Apostles completely unaltered. That’s utter nonsense. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Yeoberry (talk • contribs) 20:05, 6 August 2012 (UTC) — Yeoberry (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

Task Force Serbian Orthodox Church

Can someone helm me to stat task force in this project?--Vojvodaeist 10:13, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, lets start here. Look at the above question. What do you think we neeed to be working on? -- Secisek (talk) 18:37, 9 February 2009 (UTC)

My basic idea is to work on articles connected with Serbian Orthodox Church (first of all territorial organization and biographies). But I also can write about different Eastern Orthodox subjects from history to inter church relations. I am very interested for cooperation. When I decided to start Serbian Orthodox Church wikiproject or task force my first goal was to mark all articles on subject with template and to make table like table on this page [1]. --Vojvodaeist 08:41, 11 February 2009 (UTC)

Well, look above. What do you think should be the Top priority articles for this project? What are we missing? --Secisek (talk) 00:35, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

First of all there are no article History of Serbian Orthodox Church (now redirect). There are also no biographies of Serbian church leaders, territorial organization etc.--Vojvodaeist 06:22, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

We have a history section in the Serbian Orthodox Church article. This article should be our first priority. I am going to stub some sections in the hope you can help fill in some details with citaitions. If this article could reach GA, all the other articles you speak of could be spun off later. --Secisek (talk) 20:22, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

ОК. Iwill first work on article Serbian Orthodox Church but I think that it need be reorganized. I will start in next few days (maybe tomorrow).--Vojvodaeist 07:34, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

I put some ideas on Talk:Serbian Orthodox Church.--Vojvodaeist 08:15, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Coordinators' working group

Hi! I'd like to draw your attention to the new WikiProject coordinators' working group, an effort to bring both official and unofficial WikiProject coordinators together so that the projects can more easily develop consensus and collaborate. This group has been created after discussion regarding possible changes to the A-Class review system, and that may be one of the first things discussed by interested coordinators.

All designated project coordinators are invited to join this working group. If your project hasn't formally designated any editors as coordinators, but you are someone who regularly deals with coordination tasks in the project, please feel free to join as well. — Delievered by §hepBot (Disable) on behalf of the WikiProject coordinators' working group at 05:19, 28 February 2009 (UTC)

Orthodoxy in Albania

A new entry, created by FabioAbazaj (talk · contribs) on 8 February 2009. There were serious problems with the three references I could check (other two are in Albanian and Greek). Those blatant failures to comply with our verifiability and no original research policies makes me doubious of the entire content of this entry (mostly unreferenced). A general revision & clean-up is needed.

See Talk:Orthodoxy in Albania#Entry in need of general revision & clean-up. - Regards, Ev (talk) 17:17, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

Discussion regarding project organization

Any comments regarding the structure and function of Christianity related material are welcome at Wikipedia:WikiProject Christianity/General Forum#Project organization. Be prepared for some rather lengthy comments, though. There is a lot of material to cover there. John Carter (talk) 17:43, 13 March 2009 (UTC)

Article alerts

This is a notice to let you know about Article alerts, a fully-automated subscription-based news delivery system designed to notify WikiProjects and Taskforces when articles are entering Articles for deletion, Requests for comment, Peer review and other workflows (full list). The reports are updated on a daily basis, and provide brief summaries of what happened, with relevant links to discussion or results when possible. A certain degree of customization is available; WikiProjects and Taskforces can choose which workflows to include, have individual reports generated for each workflow, have deletion discussion transcluded on the reports, and so on. An example of a customized report can be found here.

If you are already subscribed to Article Alerts, it is now easier to report bugs and request new features. We are also in the process of implementing a "news system", which would let projects know about ongoing discussions on a wikipedia-wide level, and other things of interest. The developers also note that some subscribing WikiProjects and Taskforces use the display=none parameter, but forget to give a link to their alert page. Your alert page should be located at "Wikipedia:PROJECT-OR-TASKFORCE-HOMEPAGE/Article alerts". Questions and feedback should be left at Wikipedia talk:Article alerts.

Message sent by User:Addbot to all active wiki projects per request, Comments on the message and bot are welcome here.

Thanks. — Headbomb {^ταλκ_{κοντριβς} – WP Physics} 09:06, 15 March, 2009 (UTC)

Proposed mergers

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the merge request was: no consensus to support merge. --Rafy talk 07:46, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

---

It has been suggested that Wikipedia:WikiProject Oriental Orthodoxy and Wikipedia:WikiProject Christianity/Syriac Christianity work group be merged into this project, which would then have as its scope all of Eastern Christianity, possibly also changing the project's name in the process to reflect the broader scope. Opinions?

Support

1. I support both proposed mergers. John Carter (talk) 16:22, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
2. I support the proposed merger. This project is greatly understaffed and could benefit from the merging of other similar projects with similar goals. Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 16:24, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
3. Strong support, being fully aware of the differences between Oriental Orthodoxy, Eastern Orthodoxy, the Church of the East, and the Eastern traditions who owe alliegance to the Roman pope. There are so few active editors who work on anything relating to Eastern Christianity that I strongly support a consolidation. To suggest that the differences will confuse people is not being honest about our editors, we can assume that any intrested editor will KNOW the difference between - e.g. - the Copts and the Maronites. Eastern Christianity editors have long worked together on Portal:Eastern Christianity. The main focus of the project was agree on long when the {{Eastern Christianity}} template was set up. I have several other reasons for thinking this is a good thing and will present if the need arises. All in all, I would like a single nexus point for editors who are intrested in Eatsern Christianity. -- Secisek (talk) 05:13, 30 March 2009 (UTC)
4. Although not a member of the WP, Support merger. In a previous life, I was in favor of having independent wp's for different traditions. However, I have come to see the strong advantages of having a slightly wider group of interested editors involved - especially when the pool of interested editors is so very small. As to the differences between the groups, the merger is not an attempt to paint over that. Indeed, their respective traditions need not be in communion for collaboration to work. What the shared WP acknowledges is a shared history and some shared perspectives / interests that would help collaborative editing. Athanasius • Quicumque vult 19:50, 11 May 2009 (UTC)
5. I support these mergers to keep alive the efforts of those who work on Eastern Christian articles in project form. Despite the differences, the idea behind a project is to get an idea as to what needs to be worked on and to inspire better content. These mergers would do that. Monsieurdl ^{mon talk} 14:10, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

Oppose

1. There is no way anyone who understands the difference between Eastern Orthodoxy and Oriental Orthodoxy can support such a merger. The only basis for lumping them together in some peoples minds seems to be that they share the name "Orthodox". Please do not do this. They are no more the same than any two distinct branches of Christianity. B'er Rabbit (talk) 19:12, 29 March 2009 (UTC)
2. I oppose because of everything B'er Rabbit Said. ܠܝܓܘ Liju ലിജു לג"ו (talk) 04:09, 12 May 2009 (UTC)
3. No ground for such a merge. Kpant (talk) 19:45, 18 June 2009 (UTC)
4. Such a merge would inadvertently lead to many non-Eastern Orthodox users to have significant control over Eastern-Orthodox articles and this is not only unfair, but it is also unjustified! I strongly urge you to reconsider merging, especially since there are few editors! Because that means that there are very few Eastern-Orthodox editors who check the validity of the articles and the chance of ending up with inaccurate and prejudiced information becomes very high. If the editors were objective and honest, sure, we could consider a broader scope to present objective information properly, but of course if that were the case we wouldn't have so many divisions of Christianity, now would we ? Innorogue (talk) 08:04, 6 March 2010(UTC)
5. There are clear differences between "Eastern" and "Oriental" theology. They have different bishops, have different beliefs. They are separate organizations. While both groups fall under the header of "Eastern Christianity", they are not the same thing, which merging these projects would imply. It would be about as appropriate as merging a Roman Catholic wikiproject with a Protestant one under the reasoning that they are both "Western Christianity. Strong opposition. Even reading the respective articles on the subject, Oriental Orthodox and Eastern Orthodox will make the error of this merger apparent. --Pstanton (talk) 06:38, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Discussion

Considering that main difference between the churches is only the hierarchy and that most aspects relating to worship are the same makes the merger a great idea. Some churches already included in the Eastern Orthodoxy project, such as the Greek Orthodox old calendar churches, are practically identical to those of say Oriental Orthodoxy. Also the Ecumenical Patriarchate is in communion with the Coptic Orthodox Church (Oriental Orthodox) so obviously they approve of each others doctrines further proving their similarities and supporting the merge. Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 16:24, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

This is exactly where people get confused. The Coptic Church is not and never has been in communion with Eastern Orthodox, they do not approve of each others doctrines (Oriental Orthodox will never accept that Christ has two separated natures), they have had rival patriarchs for Alexandria and Antioch, etc since the 5th century, and they have had quite separate histories. The Oriental Orthodox split off from the pope in the 5th century. The Eastern Orthodox split from the Pope in the 11th century. These two groups did not arise by splitting from each other and thus their only shared history is that before the 5th century. B'er Rabbit (talk) 19:30, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

According to the wiki article, "In the summer of 2001, the Coptic Orthodox and Greek Orthodox Patriarchates of Alexandria agreed[25] to mutually recognize baptisms performed in each other's churches, making re-baptisms unnecessary, and to recognize the sacrament of marriage as celebrated by the other." I remember this because we have a lot of Coptic and Ethiopian Orthodox attending our churches, as there aren't really any Oriental Churches here. They participate just as Greek Orthodox would, no difference. Like I said, the big difference is the hierarchy, they did not unite, they just decided to recognize each other. Regardless, this is irrelevant because the purpose of the merger is to make the project more substantial. Like John Carter said, it may have to be renamed "Eastern Christianity", but either way, you cannot deny the similarities between the churches and the fact that the project would be more efficient with this merger. Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 19:45, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Agreed that they are different versions of Christianity. So, for that matter, are the Assyrian Church of the East and the various Eastern Catholic Churches. The reasons for proposing the mergers are (1) both the Syriac Christianity group and the Oriental Orthodoxy project are very inactive, so those articles receive comparatively little attention from anyone, and (2) for whatever reason, I think before I started here, Template:Eastern Christianity and Portal:Eastern Christianity already link them all as "Eastern Christianity." Personally, I'd like seperate groups on the Assyrian Church, the Eastern Catholic churches, and the Oriental Orthodox. But, right now, there doesn't seem to be much activity in either existing group, certainly not enough to justify either of the other groups continuing to, basically, vegetate and remain inactive. John Carter (talk) 19:47, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

I don't think lack of activity right now is a good reason for lumping in distinct groups either. Wikipedia isn't going anywhere, it continues to grow. Try to imagine 50 years from now, there may be millions of more editors, including members of both faiths, who haven't even been born yet. What is the rush to get everything "moving" quickly? There is a place to deal with the Oriental project if anything comes up, and there are editors like myself who watch the page and respond accordingly and do not wish it to be lumped in, that seems to imply just too much that isn't reality. B'er Rabbit (talk) 20:03, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Lack of activity generally equals lack of attention to the articles, and that is something I think the articles on the OO shouldn't have. And, for what it's worth, you might be interested in seeing here that I created that project myself. The purpose of merging is to prevent the articles from suffering the lack of attention and lack of development that they have recently been experiencing. I've heard elsewhere User:Secisek indicating that he was one of the few actively involved in not just the project, but developing the content, and that is what the project is for. Not many people leave notes on any project talk page, anyway. And, in any event, that page is just a way to support the content, and, right now, that project has been supporting the content rather inadequately. Getting more eyes who have an interest in the articles is always to the benefit of the content. I've myself observed that project from the time I created it, and have seen little reason to think that my hopes that it would be an effective collaboration will be fulfilled. My interest is in seeing the content developed, and, although there are differences between the bodies, there is enough in common that the unification will likely help some of those articles in ways that they aren't now being helped by the independent group. John Carter (talk) 20:11, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

It sounds like it doesn't matter how many more reasons I point out to you for being against this, you are going to argue with all of them and end up "deciding" that it was unanimous to lump them in together anyway as if they were practically the same thing and as if there was no objection from anyone. We're used to that kind of treatment. B'er Rabbit (talk) 20:26, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

Obviously we will be waiting for more input. The projects won't be merged unless there is consensus. So far only 3 people have commented, which also hints at the projects' lack of participation. I would like at least 20 people to weigh in. Grk1011/Stephen (talk) 21:25, 29 March 2009 (UTC)

That is optomistic. I doubt we will find 20 active editors between the three projects in question and I belong to two of them. I dropped my membership from the third because there was NOBODY editing there and almost all of the subject in Syraic Christianity are also cover by the other two that I belong to. In the future, as WP grows, an Eastern Orthodox workgroup, as well as a Oriental workgroup and others, can be split off. -- Secisek (talk) 05:13, 30 March 2009 (UTC)

There are more editors interested and knowledgeable in Oriental Orthodoxy and how it actually does NOT particularly have a "shared history" with Eastern Orthodoxy any more than with Roman Catholicism or with any other major branch, despite first impressions. However, many of these knowledgeable editors do not formally sign up to and watchlist the O.O. wikipedia project, which would be preferable. To reach these editors and have a realistic hope of meeting your above-stated goal of 20 opinions, someone should drop a friendly and neutrally worded advisory note informing them about this controversy existing, at pages such as Talk:Oriental Orthodoxy, Talk:Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church at a minimum. B'er Rabbit (^{Briar Patch}) 11:21, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Feel free to be bold and drop off a neutrally worded statement yourself there. However, there is a reasonable question how much importance people who have never shown any interest in a given project, despite its banner being present on most relevant pages, if they themselves have never watchlisted the project's page or joined it. John Carter (talk) 14:02, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

I have left a neutrally worded notice at said article talk pages. Athanasius • Quicumque vult 14:29, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Close?

What do we need to close this? Any other viewpoints? I think we should merge the projects and get to work. -- Secisek (talk) 04:10, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

I have left messages on the talk pages of all the other OO members who have been active recently, requesting a comment within a week if possible. It should be noted however that, even with the full nine members it has ever had, not counting the fact that two of those members have had no activity in at least a year, it has never had the ten active members suggested for a WikiProject. John Carter (talk) 18:43, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

My personal opinion is that a merge might still need the approval of anyone else in WP:OO that received the messages from John Carter, because so far, there appear to be more opinions from EO members than the others from the above discussion. That said, given that there are relatively few active members on WP:OO alone (especially as of late) I support the proposal to merge the two under a broader scope--so long as a distinction is made, at least from a historical perspective. ~ Troy (talk) 21:44, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

I would think that a 7 day response time following John Carter's individual notices to people should be appropriate. Then (18 May UTC), we need to either close this, or make an RfC for more input. Athanasius • Quicumque vult 16:56, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

I believe that the content already makes a rather marked distinction between the EO and the OO. There is no reason that would change. The purpose of any project is just to make it easier for editors to group together to work on content. The Christianity WikiProject already deals with several hundred Christian denominations and movements, and has done whatever was required to keep them differentiated where reasonable and possible, and that would doubtless continue. John Carter (talk) 17:07, 13 May 2009 (UTC)

Proposed move Maundy Thursday to Holy Thursday

• 6 Apr 2009 – Move requested from Maundy Thursday (talk) to Holy Thursday; see discussion. --Boston (talk) 21:27, 8 April 2009 (UTC)

THEOCACNA

Please watch the edits of Theocacna2 (talk · contribs)! — RHaworth (Talk | contribs) 19:26, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Does your WikiProject care about talk pages of redirects?

Does your project care about what happens to the talk pages of articles that have been replaced with redirects? If so, please provide your input at User:Mikaey/Request for Input/ListasBot 3. Thanks, Matt (talk) 01:46, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Adding an article on "Christian Liturgies"

I don't know if this already exists or not, but I thought i may be a good article. We ought to create an article about "Christian Liturgies". It would be a primary link to the liturgies of East and West, and would summarize these liturgies.

My vision of it would be first a look at the evolution of the Liturgy from the days of St. Justin Martyr to St. John Chrysostom. Then, those of us in the Eastern Orthodox tradition can provide outlines/summaries of our liturgy since St. John Chrysostom (I believe the modern form of our liturgy came into existence at ca. 1300 AD). Then those of the Western tradition can add the evolution of their Mass (liturgy) with outlines/summaries since St. John Chrysostom. This wouldn't be a main article for each liturgy, but rather an outline of all of them with their main articles going more in-depth.

Right now I have a reliable source for the Liturgy in St. Justin Martyr's day, besides his own writings, there is a book entitled: "Let Us Attend: A Journey through the Orthodox Divine Liturgy" by Father Lawrence Farley. He not only goes over the Orthodox liturgy, but at the end lists the evolution of the Divine Liturgy since St. Justin Martyr. —Preceding unsigned comment added by OrthoArchitectDU (talk • contribs) 22:06, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

What do you think? Is it worth it?

-In Christ, your lowly servant. OrthoArchitectDU (talk) 21:59, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

Consultation on renaming article: Roman Catholic Church --> Catholic Church

Wikipedians at Talk:Roman Catholic Church are discussing the merits of changing the article name as such.
Roman Catholic Church → Catholic Church. Please share your opinions there. --Carlaude ^talk 12:09, 13 June 2009 (UTC)

Christianity coordinators elections

Any parties interested in being one of the coordinators of WikiProject Christianity and its various related projects is encouraged to list themselves as a candidate at Wikipedia:WikiProject Christianity/Coordinators/Election 2. It would be particularly beneficial if we had individuals from as broad a range of areas of the project as possible, to help ensure that we have people knowledgable about the widest range of content possible. John Carter (talk) 20:47, 5 August 2009 (UTC)

GA Reassessment of Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia

I have conducted a reassessment of the above article as part of the GA Sweeps process. I have found some concerns with the referencing which you can see at Talk:Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia/GA1. I have placed the article on hold whilst these are fixed. Thanks. Jezhotwells (talk) 15:24, 6 August 2009 (UTC)

Colors used in the project page

I feel that the colors used in the project main page are garish and hard on the eyes... would anyone object to a darker red like the Imperial banner of the Byzantine Empire? Monsieurdl ^{mon talk} 14:28, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

No objections here. Feel free to be bold and make any changes you think reasonable. John Carter (talk) 14:39, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks! I finally found the appropriate box header and made the change. Now, I am going to try and add the project templates to the new articles that I created in the Byzantine History subsections now that I am back full time. I'll be working on the articles one by one. Monsieurdl ^{mon talk} 15:26, 10 November 2009 (UTC)

Ukrainian Orthodox Church - dab outreach request

Hi all, I'm from the Wikipedia:Disambiguation pages with links project, and was hoping to find some help here. You see, one of the most-linked disambiguation pages in Wikipedia is Ukrainian Orthodox Church, currently with 111 article links. Now, I've taken a look at fixing these, but I'm terribly unqualified; there are three Ukrainian Orthodox Churches, and I don't see an easy way to distinguish which one a given article is talking about, but I want to see them fixed properly. Could someone give some guidance on how to handle these (or fix a few :D)? Thanks! --JaGa^talk 21:29, 14 December 2009 (UTC)

WP 1.0 bot announcement

This message is being sent to each WikiProject that participates in the WP 1.0 assessment system. On Saturday, January 23, 2010, the WP 1.0 bot will be upgraded. Your project does not need to take any action, but the appearance of your project's summary table will change. The upgrade will make many new, optional features available to all WikiProjects. Additional information is available at the WP 1.0 project homepage. — Carl (CBM · talk) 03:14, 22 January 2010 (UTC)

Help with Another Gospel (Christian countercult book)

I would like to ask if anyone here would be willing to go look at the page on Another Gospel (an anti-"cult" book from the evangelical publisher Zondervan).

This book does not list Eastern Orthodoxy as one of the "cults" it targets. However, the current text of the article explains that the book tells how various religious groups "deviate from orthodox Christianity" — where the reference is clearly to western "mainstream" or "evangelical" Christian belief as being "orthodox".

Changing this wording on the page — or even successfully qualifying or explaining it — may be problematic because the text is in fact a direct quote from the front flap of the book jacket (and thus arguably supportable by "reliable sources").

Any input on this or other aspects of the article — with a view toward improving its quality, enhancing its NPOV, providing context for general readers, and any other worthy goal — would undoubtedly help. The page currently suffers from a dearth of editors. Please be sure to read the talk page carefully before jumping in, as there have been some serious disputes going on. Richwales (talk) 00:19, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

RFC for Another Gospel

Please see Talk:Another_Gospel#RfC:_NPOV_and_article_Another_Gospel. Thank you for your time, Cirt (talk) 00:38, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

Russianization

I am very concerned by a number of edits by User:Bertelin, who has been moving a number of ecclesiastical articles from the Greek to the Russian titles without discussion, and sometimes with misleading edit summaries ("standardized spelling", "reflective of more common usage"). The Greek forms are normally used by non-Orthodox English-speakers and should generally have priority. Examples:Kamilavka, Omophor, Antimins. Johnbod (talk) 21:57, 21 May 2010 (UTC)

Expert help needed

A few sections in Catholic–Eastern Orthodox theological differences have a seemingly inferior logic that perhaps affects a larger selection of subsections. Those interested who are proficient in theology, philosophy and logic, might give a helping hand by assessing relevant subsections and giving comment at the talk page HERE! Thank you for your attention, and otherwise happy editing! Rursus dixit. (^mbork³!) 09:14, 14 June 2010 (UTC)

Bishop article naming

I've noticed a bit of inconsistency in the article naming for bishop articles. See:

Daniel (Nushiro) of Japan but then we have Ilia II of Georgia, which excludes the parenthetical surname, and then there is Kalistos Ware, which doesn't include a "of Diokleia", but maybe that is only due to his not being a primate? But then we have Jonah (Paffhausen) which, while he is a primate, doesn't have an "of America" or an "of the Orthodox Church in America", which is present in Archbishop Demetrios of America.

And contrast all of this variety with the extremely lengthy name, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople, which is different from the EP two back, Patriarch Athenagoras I of Constantinople and those preceding it in containing the word "Ecumenical".

I think we should develop a standard policy for naming EO bishops on Wikipedia. Whether or not we include their title, surname in parenthesis and jurisdiction.

Personally, I think titles should be excluded, surnames should be parenthetical, and their sees should follow. Oh, and I think the "I" in Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople is pointlessly redundant.

In the form of: "Bartholomew (Archontónis) of Constantinople", "Kallistos (Ware) of Diokleia". Following Daniel (Nushiro) of Japan as a model. --Pstanton (talk) 21:53, 18 June 2010 (UTC)

Howdy need opinions at Talk:East–West Schism,

Yesterday I was invited to a Discusion at Talk:East–West Schism as part of a WP:3O,

I am now posting this to get wider opinion on the Dispute in Question from Relevant WikiProjects

Thank you for your time Weaponbb7 (talk) 15:07, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

tagging

Is it possible to assume that othodoxyproject is the valid tag and ChristianityWikiProject|eastern-orthodoxy=yes is not? SatuSuro 12:27, 7 August 2010 (UTC)

Catholic–Eastern Orthodox theological differences

There is an ongoing dispute at Catholic–Eastern Orthodox theological differences regarding the nature of the physical, material, fleshly body of man. One editor appears to be insisting that, according to EO teaching, the material body did not exist before the fall of man and will not exist after the resurrection. Another editor disagrees with this interpretation, and the two have been going back and forth on this and other issues for a very, very long time. See, for example, Catholic–Eastern Orthodox theological differences#The sarx as the "garments_of_skin" and consequences of the "fall_of_man", as well as Talk:Catholic–Eastern Orthodox theological differences. I have been trying (not very successfully) to get the two parties to find a consensus, but I am not familiar with the fine points of EO theology, and it seems to me that the best (only?) solution here is to get some more people involved over there who do have a background in this area. Richwales (talk · contribs) 22:21, 27 August 2010 (UTC)

Eastern Orthodoxy articles have been selected for the Wikipedia 0.8 release

Version 0.8 is a collection of Wikipedia articles selected by the Wikipedia 1.0 team for offline release on USB key, DVD and mobile phone. Articles were selected based on their assessed importance and quality, then article versions (revisionIDs) were chosen for trustworthiness (freedom from vandalism) using an adaptation of the WikiTrust algorithm.

We would like to ask you to review the Eastern Orthodoxy articles and revisionIDs we have chosen. Selected articles are marked with a diamond symbol (♦) to the right of each article, and this symbol links to the selected version of each article. If you believe we have included or excluded articles inappropriately, please contact us at Wikipedia talk:Version 0.8 with the details. You may wish to look at your WikiProject's articles with cleanup tags and try to improve any that need work; if you do, please give us the new revisionID at Wikipedia talk:Version 0.8. We would like to complete this consultation period by midnight UTC on Monday, October 11th.

We have greatly streamlined the process since the Version 0.7 release, so we aim to have the collection ready for distribution by the end of October, 2010. As a result, we are planning to distribute the collection much more widely, while continuing to work with groups such as One Laptop per Child and Wikipedia for Schools to extend the reach of Wikipedia worldwide. Please help us, with your WikiProject's feedback!

For the Wikipedia 1.0 editorial team, SelectionBot 22:23, 19 September 2010 (UTC)

Christianity portals

I am currently trying to get together some lists of articles relevant to each Christianity-related portal which could be used, at least potentially, to help bring all the extant portals up to Featured Portal status. The current, admittedly incomplete, list of articles, images, etc., relevant to each portal can be found at User:John Carter/Christianity portals. I also think that, at least in theory, we would probably best use a single article only in a single portal, and that we probably have enough articles to do that, although there might be a few exceptions. I would welcome input from anyone on the associated talk page regarding which articles and other materials they would like to see associated with which portal(s), any suggestions for additional portals or changes to existing portals, etc. Thank you. John Carter (talk) 15:35, 29 September 2010 (UTC)

Proposed move of Mary (mother of Jesus)

It has been proposed that the article currently titled Mary (mother of Jesus) be renamed Virgin Mary. Your views and vote will be appreciated. Thank you. Xandar 23:40, 27 October 2010 (UTC)

Need attention on Order of Saint Benedict (Orthodox)

This has a set of external links but no references. It also has had some issues with conflicting claims. If someone could source this properly I would appreciate the help. Mangoe (talk) 00:30, 8 December 2010 (UTC)

God's existences (plural)

It would be good if an Eastern Orthodox theologian would examine the question raised here. Esoglou (talk) 07:44, 24 December 2010 (UTC)

Linking feast dates for old calendar

See Ketevan of Mukhrani, a saint of the Georgian Orthodox Church. Her feast day (anniversary of her martyrdom) is September 13, but since the Georgian Orthodox Church uses the old calendar, it's observed in Georgia on September 26. Right now, the article says "September 26", but the date is linked to September 13 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics) — possibly not the clearest way to do it, because (1) some people may think it's a mistake that text saying "September 26" is linked to a "September 13" page, and/or (2) some people may think it's a mistake that the date is listed in the article text as the 26th instead of the 13th. I assume this is an issue pertaining to many articles, not just this one, and maybe the project already has a standard way of dealing with it, so I wanted to call it to people's attention so the "right thing" can be done in this article. Richwales (talk · contribs) 19:49, 25 December 2010 (UTC)

Some anti-Catholic edits

Recently I came to be aware of the work of an IP editor 24.3.217.6 (talk · contribs). Many of his edits seemed to me problematic. He is apparently Orthodox, and has worked to minimize the mention of Eastern Catholic Churches, taking a dim view of their position in the Church of Rome. At some points for example, he denies that parts of Byzantine liturgy are shared in Catholic praxis. He has even made some dubious claims about Orthodoxy, for example, that "No Salvation Outside the Church" is a Roman idea - pardon me if I'm wrong, but it was taught as early as Saint Cyprian of Carthage, yes? I didn't touch that edit because I am not an expert in Eastern theology, but it is sourced and attributed to Kallistos Ware. I would like all articles to adhere to WP:NPOV policy, and this tendency to write out Eastern Catholicism is, I think you'll agree, hostile. Please have a look over his contributions, and my reversions, and see if you have anything constructive to add to our changes. Thanks. Elizium23 (talk) 03:56, 26 January 2011 (UTC)

Request for input at the reference desk

There is a question waiting for an answer at the Humanities desk: "Russian Orthodox question: "first" and "second" resurrections". (For the newly created article on Nikolai Obukhov). Thanks in advance! ---Sluzzelin talk 10:10, 4 February 2011 (UTC)

Requested move of Orthodox Church (Chalcedonian)

The article Eastern Orthodox Church was recently moved, with no discussion, to Orthodox Church (Chalcedonian). I have started a formal requested move to undo this. Please join the discussion at Talk:Orthodox Church (Chalcedonian)#Requested move. Thank you. Elizium23 (talk) 21:10, 15 February 2011 (UTC)

Conflict involving Serbian Orthodoxy

About the Diocese of Australia and New Zealand...

sr:Template:Српска православна црква says it is a metropolitanate while Template:Serbian Orthodox subdivisions says it is an eparchy.

Which one is it? WhisperToMe (talk) 07:13, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

Saint Joseph of Damascus

I can't find any independent sources about this person. Are there lists of Greek Orthodox saints?   Will Beback  talk  06:37, 31 March 2011 (UTC)

Request for input in discussion forum

Given the closely linked subjects of the various religion, mythology, and philosophy groups, it seems to me that we might benefit from having some sort of regular topical discussion forum to discuss the relevant content. I have put together the beginnings of an outline for such discussion at Wikipedia:WikiProject Religion/2011 meeting, and would very much appreciate the input of any interested editors. I am thinking that it might run over two months, the first of which would be to bring forward and discuss the current state of the content, and the second for perhaps some more focused discussion on what, if any, specific efforts might be taken in the near future. Any and all input is more than welcome. John Carter (talk)

_{Automated message by Project Messenger Bot from John Carter at 15:44, 5 April 2011}

Militant atheism RfC

There is a raging RfC at Militant atheism. Don't miss out on the discussion of the year! Click here. – Lionel ^(talk) 04:27, 22 September 2011 (UTC)

DYK nomination for C. A. Patrides

The DYK nomination for C. A. Patrides needs to be reviewed.

• Did you know ... that Constantinos A. Patrides, the author of Milton and the Christian tradition, earned a medal for heroism for his boyhood service with the Greek Resistance against the German Occupation?

The medal was awarded by the His Holiness, the Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem. Patrides was a faithful member of the Greek Orthodox church, and wrote about Origen and other Eastern Orthodox theologians during his amazingly productive career.

Thanks!  Kiefer.Wolfowitz 14:24, 17 November 2011 (UTC)

A category for Eastern Orthodoxy in Film

I was reading the Ostrov page and I realized that we don't have a Wiki category for films concerning Eastern Orthodoxy, and I think one would be useful. Would anyone be willing to help me find out exactly which Eastern Orthodox themed movies have pages here on Wikipedia so we could perhaps get a category started for them? Thanks. Sima Yi (talk) 03:04, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

problems in Memorial service (Orthodox)

• Please fix the rotated image in Memorial service (Orthodox)
• Please add and explain the origins and meanings of the words паннихида παννυχίς and mention their variant spellings панихида and πανυχίς. Apparently the double consonant is the older spelling, see http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/morph?l=pannuxi%2Fs&la=greek --Espoo (talk) 07:53, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Category: Eastern Orthodox churches in Canada

• See proposal to merge Category:Eastern Orthodox churches in Canada into Category:Eastern Orthodox church buildings in Canada; any comments? Hugo999 (talk) 13:32, 9 January 2012 (UTC)

Unsourced since 2010, content deleted from Christian conditionalism

If someone thinks this is legitimate can be restored. Starts here

---

For many centuries inherent immortality, supported with the Platonic arguments about the simplicity of the soul, was accepted among many famous Fathers of the Eastern Church, such as Athanasius, Gregory of Nyssa or John of Damascus. But current Eastern Orthodox theologians, who hold that the Incarnation united the Divine and human natures, and hold that each man is a hypostasis comprising spirit and body, deny inherent immortality and profess "immortality by grace" (κατὰ χάριν ἀθανασία kata charin athanasia). Beyond using Biblical verses that present immortality as a result of Christ's victory over death and His resurrection, they also stress the witness of the patristic writings of the 2nd century, when Christian apologists highlighted the contrast between their view and the Platonists' view. A classic example is the statement of Tatian, who said: "The soul is not in itself immortal, O Greeks, but mortal. Yet it is possible for it not to die" (Oratio ad Graecos, 13).

Nevertheless, in the view of many Eastern Orthodox theologians, there is no place for annihilationism, since the church holds that immortality is bestowed on all men by means of Christ's incarnation and resurrection, inasmuch as they participate in the nature of man. The uncreated Divine Light (ἄκτιστο φῶς aktisto fos) is offered to all.

---

deleted section ends here In ictu oculi (talk) 14:10, 23 January 2012 (UTC)

Proposed redirection of Christianity subproject talk pages

I have recently started discussion about possibly eliminating the use of a separate talk page for it here. Input from any interested editors is very welcome and encouraged. Thank you. John Carter (talk) 22:18, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

WikiWomen's History Month

Hi everyone. March is Women's History Month and I'm hoping a few folks here at WP:Eastern Orthodoxy will have interest in putting on events related to women's roles in Eastern Orthodoxy. We've created an event page on English Wikipedia (please translate!) and I hope you'll find the inspiration to participate. These events can take place off wiki, like edit-a-thons, or on wiki, such as themes and translations. Please visit the page here: WikiWomen's History Month. Thanks for your consideration and I look forward to seeing events take place! SarahStierch (talk) 19:10, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Christian Symbolism Article

Should the Christian symbolism article have a WikiProject Eastern Orthodoxy tag on it? I see that it already has WikiProject Catholicism and WikiProject Anglicanism tags on it, but the Eastern Orthodox Church is probably more notable for Christian symbolism. Since I'm not involved in WikiProject Eastern Orthodoxy, I don't feel that I'm authorized to tag this article on your WikiProject's behalf. Thanks! --Dulcimerist (talk) 16:21, 13 April 2012 (UTC)

Helena Dragas is actually the Greek queen of Byzantium with the name Helen – Dragasis Palaiologos also known as Saint Hipomoni!

In the article Helena Dragas she is not refered with her real full name. She was the Queen of Byzantium with the name Augusta Helen – Dragasis Palaiologos, daughter of the emperor of Slavic nation, Constantine Dragasis. She became empress of Byzantium as wife of Emmanuel B’ the Palaiologos and she was mother of the last emperor of Byzantium Costantine Palaiologos. I strongly suggest to change her name from Helena Dragas (which is slavic) to Helen – Dragasis Palaiologos (which is Greek), because she was an empress of Byzantium and firstly I don't find it appropriate to refer to her with her slavic name (she lived in Byzantium in Greece and not in Serbia) and secondly you can find plenty of reference with her name as Helen – Dragasis Palaiologos. Also many texts refer to her as Saint Patience (Saint Hipomoni). Her memory is celebrated in the Orthodox Greek church on 29 May 688dim (talk) 19:43, 29 May 2012 (UTC)

GA Nomination of Georgian Orthodox Church

Just dropping a note here to inform all interested editors that I've nominated Georgian Orthodox Church for Good Article. The article used to be a battleground, but intensive work in the last months has hopefully solved most old issues and produced a rather decent result. All input in the reviewing process is welcome!--Susuman77 (talk) 13:55, 30 June 2012 (UTC)

Eastern Orthodox view on the authority of OT books not accepted by contemporary Jews or Protestants

I have raised the issue of what the EO view is and whether one particular article accurately describes it. Responses would be appreciated. Talk:Deuterocanonical_books#Article mis-states Eastern Orthodox position ZackMartin (talk) 12:51, 31 July 2012 (UTC)

Iconoclasm and related articles

We have an editor making large additions to Iconoclasm and related articles: Yeoberry (talk · contribs). Your attention and discussion of the merits would be appreciated. Elizium23 (talk) 03:42, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

I have a Ph.D. in church history. The material I'm adding is with proper citation and helps to balance what would be otherwise biased articles. Please stop deleting and changing my contributions unless you have obvious reasons to do so. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Yeoberry (talk • contribs) 03:54, 5 August 2012 (UTC) — Yeoberry (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

My contributions are (1) accurate, (2) needed to bring balance and back-ground to otherwise biased articles, and (3) with citations. So please stop deleting them. I'm beginning to wonder if you're doing so simply to preserve biased presentations of Eastern Orthodoxy and Iconoclasm.

Before the Council of Hieria (754), the issue of icons had been addressed by The Council of Elvira (c. 305) which stated, "Pictures are not to be placed in churches, so that they do not become objects of worship and adoration.". Eusebius wrote Constantia (the sister of Constantine) a very stern reply when she asked for an image of Jesus. He knew that such pictures existed in the marketplaces but he didn’t believe that the people who make such things were Christians. He took it for granted that only pagan artists would dream of making such representations. Eusebius. He insisted that even the incarnate Christ cannot appear in an image, for “the flesh which He put on for our sake … was mingled with the glory of His divinity so that the mortal part was swallowed up by Life.” This was the splendour that Christ revealed in the Transfiguration and which cannot be captured in human art. To depict purely the human form of Christ before its transformation, on the other hand, is to break the commandment of God and to fall into pagan error." Bishop Epiphanius (c. 394) noted how he had destroyed an icon. The purists also noted how the icons were apparently borrowed from the idols of paganism. Henry Chadwick writes, “In this instinct there was a measure of truth. The representations of Christ as the Almighty Lord on his judgment throne owed something to pictures of Zeus. Portraits of the Mother of God were not wholly independent of a pagan past of venerated mother-goddesses. In the popular mind the saints had come to fill a role that had been played by heroes and deities.” — Preceding unsigned comment added by Yeoberry (talk • contribs) 03:57, 5 August 2012 (UTC) — Yeoberry (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

I think you're deleting my changes in order to preserve biased articles in favor of Eastern Orthodoxy. Please stop it.

The Second Council of Nicaea claims to be the seventh of the first seven ecumenical councils recognized as such by both West and East. Since the Protestant Reformation, Orthodox, Catholics, and Old Catholics unanimously recognize it; Protestant opinions on it are varied. The prior synod of 754 had first claimed to be the rightful Seventh Ecumenical Council.

In 754 the Byzantine Emperor Constantine V (741–775) convened a council. Three hundred and thirty-three bishops attended. It endorsed his iconoclast position, with the bishops declaring, "the unlawful art of painting living creatures blasphemed the fundamental doctrine of our salvation--namely, the Incarnation of Christ, and contradicted the six holy synods. . . . If anyone shall endeavour to represent the forms of the Saints in lifeless pictures with material colours which are of no value (for this notion is vain and introduced by the devil), and does not rather represent their virtues as living images in himself, etc. . . . let him be anathema."' This council declared itself the 'Seventh Ecumenical Council'.'

In response, at the behest of Empress Irene, another council called together in AD 787 in Nicaea (site of the First Council of Nicaea; present-day İznik in Turkey) to restore the honoring of icons (or, holy images), which had been suppressed by imperial edict inside the Byzantine Empire during the reign of Leo III (717–741). --Yeoberry (talk) 04:06, 5 August 2012 (UTC)John Carpenter, yeoberry@yahoo.com --Yeoberry (talk) 04:06, 5 August 2012 (UTC)— Yeoberry (talk • contribs) has made few or no other edits outside this topic.

This stuff has been added to Icon, Eastern Christianity, Eastern Orthodox Church, and I think elsewhere in very similar form. I and others have reverted it there but I have added some of it, wikified and with the wilder POV removed to the more appropriate articles: Byzantine iconoclasm and Aniconism in Christianity. As you know perfectly well, the iconoclast Council of Hieria included no representatives from the Pentarchy & was rapidly rejected by both East and West. The Synod of Elvira was a provincial Spanish synod, not all of whose proceeding are accepted as genuine, and which also (for example) forbad association and marriage between Christians and Jews and pagans. You don't need Chadwick (no art historian) to point out that post-Constantinian monumental Christian art owed a good deal to imperial and pagan precedents, which every art historian for the last 150 years has pointed out, though they concentrate more on the links with imperial imagery. I can't be bothered to keep up with the proliferating insertions now, but no doubt others will. Icon is getting really messy, btw. Johnbod (talk) 04:18, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

On the contrary, I am trying to preserve the integrity of these articles and observe the policy of WP:NPOV, while you appear to be aggressively promoting an agenda that makes the Church look bad and wrong. Please read the policy mentioned, especially WP:DUE. Your edits read as unencyclopedic polemics from where I am sitting. You are also warring, across multiple articles, to keep your changes in. The proper thing to do when you are reverted is to stop and discuss. You are not so much discussing as bloviating and copy-pasting more polemics into this talk page. Elizium23 (talk) 04:20, 5 August 2012 (UTC)

Someone (likely User:Johnbod|Johnbod) obviously has a very pro-Eastern Orthodox/icons POV which they are pushing and suppressing referenced facts that is unfavorable to their POV. Please stop it. --Yeoberry (talk) 20:00, 6 August 2012 (UTC)yeoberry@yahoo.com--Yeoberry (talk) 20:00, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

The above accusation is both unfounded and a violation of WP:NPA, which I suggest certain editors read. I have dealt with Johnbod regularly over the years, and, although we have had disagreements on some issues, I have never had any evidence to belief that he is in any way the POV pusher he is being accused of. For instances when there exists such dispute, it is perfectly permissable as per WP:BRD for an editor to revert any edit, and then reasonable discussion of the disputed matter can take place there. There is evidently no clear history of this. Also, there is evidence of edit warring as per WP:EDITWAR. Should any editor engage in such edit warring, they are potentially subject to being blocked. I very strongly urge the new editor above to act in accord with wikipedia's policies and guidelines and bring matters of dispute to the relevant article talk pages, and, if he so desire, post links at this and perhaps other associated WikiProject pages to that discussion, or potentially file a request for comment as per WP:RFC. However, this particular thread seems to be rather less than productive, and perhaps read the relevant guidelines and policies, including but not limited to those linked to here. John Carter (talk) 22:02, 6 August 2012 (UTC)

"Bulgarian Orthodox Church" - what's happening ? !

Since 1992, the BOCh is rent by bitter strife about Patriarch Maxim's Legitimacy, with counter-synod, counter-Patriarch and all. This lasts now for 20 years and engendered (July 2004)a nationwide police action; it kept shaking the believing section of the Nation.

I checked the article's Bg., Eng., German, French versions - there is such a conspicuous TOTAL SILENCE that for me there must be some industrious deletor at work. I ignore whether the Talk pages are as well "cleanable" if someone wants so. Only the Polish version gives détails of the strife, but nothing for the last 3 1/2 years.

Shattered information can be gotten from BOCh - Alternative Synod[[. This exists NOT in Bg., and the English and French versions are in blatant contradiction. The Belorussian version informs Maxim was KGB agent - the Jan.17th, 2012 Commission report does not name him -

- that beginning 2009, the Alternatives hold 3 Eparchies and 12 Prichody, and about another split in 2010, ending with a red link.

The Polish version holds yet another story that Maxim and the Government openly refute the Human Rights' Court's Jan. 22nd, 2009 decision in favour of the AS. According to Polish WP, since 2005 Boris is the dissident church's Primate. But churchbg.livejournal.com claims Inokentij to have triggered the "scandalous" two Strasbourg decisions.

Both versions lack working links.

It is through more luck than perseverance that I found разкол в БПЦ in the Bg. Uikipedija. This article need absolutely be taken into the English, Polish, Russian WPs. It says counter-Patriarch Pimen submitted to the pan-Orthodox synod's vote of Oct 1st, 1998, and reverted to Maxim's synod.

This article has a link [[2]]: "Хроника и Факти по преодоляването на разкола в БПЦ " covering time till Jan. 22, 2009 decision of European Court of Human Rights against Maxim, plus annexed Sept. 16, 2010 decision against the Alternatives' financial compensation claims. Heavy bias pro-Maxim. It looks at first glance well détailed. but on closer scrutiny: Where is the post Oct. 1st, 1998 rueful reversal of Pimen and Kalinik to the Maxim faction? And again, the chronicle effectively stops in April 2005 - rest are annexes.

The article got revised III/2009 through IX/2011; it has no extra-Bg. version.

The Belorussian WP links to an Афіцыйны сайт: Bulgarian-Orthodox-church.eu which is but a dating + money credit site; only the Japanese (!) version has links to "Jesus" (--> German commercial spam) and "Youth Ministry".

Finally, there is, in Bg. and Polish, Пимен Неврокопски. The Bg. version has at its bottom a stark out-of-place link to "Macedonia Portal". Both versions are ABSOLUTELY silent about what Pimen DID in his 2 - 3 years of Patriarchate. They are mute as well about his post Oct. 1st, 1998 reversal to Maxim's Synod.

To sum up: This whole mess is 1) IMPORTANT

                             2) in BAD need of being REWRITTEN.

Link: [[3]]

The whole should as well be covered in RUSSIAN.

Regards from Nuremberg angel.garcia2001@googlemail.com   84.148.22.38 (talk) 13:12, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

"Bulgarian Orthodox Church" - what's happening ? !

Since 1992, the BOCh is rent by bitter strife about Patriarch Maxim's Legitimacy, with counter-synod, counter-Patriarch and all. This lasts now for 20 years and engendered (July 2004)a nationwide police action; it kept shaking the believing section of the Nation.

I checked the article's Bg., Eng., German, French versions - there is such a conspicuous TOTAL SILENCE that for me there must be some industrious deletor at work. I ignore whether the Talk pages are as well "cleanable" if someone wants so. Only the Polish version gives détails of the strife, but nothing for the last 3 1/2 years.

Shattered information can be gotten from BOCh - Alternative Synod[[. This exists NOT in Bg., and the English and French versions are in blatant contradiction. The Belorussian version informs Maxim was KGB agent - the Jan.17th, 2012 Commission report does not name him -

- that beginning 2009, the Alternatives hold 3 Eparchies and 12 Prichody, and about another split in 2010, ending with a red link.

The Polish version holds yet another story that Maxim and the Government openly refute the Human Rights' Court's Jan. 22nd, 2009 decision in favour of the AS. According to Polish WP, since 2005 Boris is the dissident church's Primate. But churchbg.livejournal.com claims Inokentij to have triggered the "scandalous" two Strasbourg decisions.

Both versions lack working links.

It is through more luck than perseverance that I found разкол в БПЦ in the Bg. Uikipedija. This article need absolutely be taken into the English, Polish, Russian WPs. It says counter-Patriarch Pimen submitted to the pan-Orthodox synod's vote of Oct 1st, 1998, and reverted to Maxim's synod.

This article has a link [[4]]: "Хроника и Факти по преодоляването на разкола в БПЦ " covering time till Jan. 22, 2009 decision of European Court of Human Rights against Maxim, plus annexed Sept. 16, 2010 decision against the Alternatives' financial compensation claims. Heavy bias pro-Maxim. It looks at first glance well détailed. but on closer scrutiny: Where is the post Oct. 1st, 1998 rueful reversal of Pimen and Kalinik to the Maxim faction? And again, the chronicle effectively stops in April 2005 - rest are annexes.

The article got revised III/2009 through IX/2011; it has no extra-Bg. version.

The Belorussian WP links to an Афіцыйны сайт: Bulgarian-Orthodox-church.eu which is but a dating + money credit site; only the Japanese (!) version has links to "Jesus" (--> German commercial spam) and "Youth Ministry".

Finally, there is, in Bg. and Polish, Пимен Неврокопски. The Bg. version has at its bottom a stark out-of-place link to "Macedonia Portal". Both versions are ABSOLUTELY silent about what Pimen DID in his 2 - 3 years of Patriarchate. They are mute as well about his post Oct. 1st, 1998 reversal to Maxim's Synod.

To sum up: This whole mess is 1) IMPORTANT

                             2) in BAD need of being REWRITTEN.

Link: [[5]]

The whole should as well be covered in RUSSIAN.

Regards from Nuremberg angel.garcia2001@googlemail.com   84.148.22.38 (talk) 14:25, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

I had not checked the Russian WP. Sorry I see some of what I summon is to be found there: Болгарская православная церковь . García 84.148.22.38 (talk) 14:25, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

Gregory of Nazianzus FARC

I have nominated Gregory of Nazianzus for a featured article review here. Please join the discussion on whether this article meets featured article criteria. Articles are typically reviewed for two weeks. If substantial concerns are not addressed during the review period, the article will be moved to the Featured Article Removal Candidates list for a further period, where editors may declare "Keep" or "Delist" the article's featured status. The instructions for the review process are here.--Redtigerxyz ^Talk 13:28, 14 October 2012 (UTC)

Template discussion

Please see Template talk:Christianity#"Eastern Catholic" is not a denomination for a discussion. Thank you. Elizium23 (talk) 22:40, 19 October 2012 (UTC)

RFC: TFD: Merge Template:Coptic Popes into Template:Patriarchs of Alexandria

On December 21, I proposed merging Template:Coptic Popes into Template:Patriarchs of Alexandria, because upon close examination the latter is a perfect superset of the former. I respectfully suggest that members of this WikiProject should comment on that Merge Discussion. The Mysterious El Willstro (talk) 18:22, 26 December 2012 (UTC)

Prelest

Prelest (a Russian/Orthodox term for spiritual delusion) is a new article by a new editor that has at least some obvious issues of neutrality (WP:NPOV) and reliable sourcing (WP:RS). For example, the section on "Prelest and saints of the Roman Catholic Church" includes St. Francis of Assisi, St. Theresa of Avila, St. Ignatius of Loyola, and St. Thomas à Kempis among those who were guilty of being in delusion and self-deception. It would be helpful for some knowledgable editors to separate the wheat from the chafe in this lengthy and well-cited (but not necessarily well-referenced) article, as I don't know where to begin. First Light (talk) 02:38, 17 January 2013 (UTC)

Madonna

• (Discuss) – Madonna (art) → Madonna Kauffner (talk) 11:24, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Conflating the Byzantine Rite with Eastern Christianity

A blessed Clean Monday to all, and glory to Jesus Christ! I come to respectfully ask a question and I hope I will not offend those in this project by wondering. I have often read or edited articles related to Orthodoxy which frequently highlight characteristics of what I perceive as belonging only to the Byzantine Rite, and ascribing it all to Orthodoxy or even Eastern Christianity as a whole. Now we know that there five other families: Alexandrian, Antiochene, Armenian, East and West Syrian. What I am wondering is if these articles have omitted information about the other five Eastern rites and claimed Byzantine practice as pertaining to all the East. What I do not know is the extent of this error, because I have only attended Roman and Byzantine liturgies, and I have precious little personal knowledge of the other Rites, and there is equally little information about them on the English-speaking web that I have been able to search so far. As a prime example let me show you Great Lent. There are many references to traditional practices, names, and liturgical terms that I think must belong only to the Byzantine tradition. What are the practices of other Rites for Great Lent? The article does not say. If I read this article then I would be forced to conclude that the 22 Eastern Catholic Churches and all the Oriental/Eastern Orthodox and ACoE have a unity of worship that does not exist. Now perhaps this particular WikiProject is not inclined or equipped to expand on the practices of Rites that are not in the Eastern Orthodox Byzantine tradition, but I was hoping you could at least help me identify specifically Byzantine practices and mark them as such in the articles so that the correct terminology is used to identify these traditions. Thank you in advance. Elizium23 (talk) 03:36, 19 March 2013 (UTC)

Article title of Monastery of the Panagia Hodegetria

Hi, i've added a question regarding the title of the article on the Monastery of the Panagia Hodegetria and would be very glad about any hints regarding the name commonly used for that monatery. Thanks in advance! --Fl.schmitt (talk) 06:27, 13 July 2013 (UTC)

List of Russian Orthodox churches

Hi, i've started up List of Russian Orthodox churches with a focus so far on major ones having Wikipedia articles plus a bunch of U.S. National Register-listed ones in Alaska. I wonder if this can be helpful, and i'd welcome any editing contributions. Could someone rate its importance for this wikiproject? I'd be willing to help create other Orthodox church lists, too; I happen to have noticed the many Alaska R.O. ones is why i started there. Cheers, --doncram 21:50, 10 September 2013 (UTC) P.S. There is List of Anabaptist churches, too, also on {{Lists of churches}}, and perhaps also of interest here. --doncram

Eastern Liturgical Feasts being removed

For articles for:

December 2nd

December 3rd

December 6th

December 8th

December 10th

December 11th

December 12th

December 13th

December 14th

December 15th

December 24th

December 26th

December 27th

December 28th

December 29th

December 30th

December 31st

The link to the Eastern Orthodox liturgics is not present. I do not know if they never were added, or if they were removed by a user. I do not know if this has been done to other months, but I only checked this month. Just letting you know that it will need to be put in again, but I do not have the time to do so and I don't really know how. I will post also to the Eastern Orthodox page about this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.73.114.111 (talk) 06:09, 10 December 2013 (UTC)

Freedom of religion in Georgia — looking for comments

Hi. I've done a major revision (essentially a total rewrite) of the article on Freedom of religion in Georgia, in preparation for (hopefully) nominating it for Good Article status. I would be grateful for feedback — especially pointers to any reliable sources which might cast a more positive light on the attitudes and actions of the Georgian Orthodox Church (GOC) and its adherents towards followers of other faiths (or of no faith). Right now, the article feels (to me) heavily biased against the GOC, but given what the sources I've found so far are saying, I don't see any way to change this and still satisfy the NPOV policy requirement that an article must fairly and proportionately represent what the published reliable sources say. If the situation really is as one-sided as this, then, of course, the article may be just fine as is — but I want to do my due diligence on this point. Thanks for any input — Richwales (no relation to Jimbo) 03:49, 2 January 2014 (UTC)

I'm far from expert about Georgia, so this is for what it's worth. I too am always wary of bias when I read about something I know little about, and after looking over the article and its sources, I share your concern. In my experience, there is no such thing as a one-sided situation, just a one-sided viewpoint. Shining a more positive light may not be the exact goal, but it is quite possible to get one when another viewpoint is shown. I understand the difficulty of getting a different viewpoint that is published or available in English.

I might question how reliable some of the sources really are. Very many provide daily journalism, concerned only about reporting isolated incidents, not in giving perspective or background to those events. The article needs such analysis and research to support a truly encyclopedic discussion of the topic. These sources have not done it, and hence are questionable as to whether or not they are reliable for this purpose. As for viewpoint, it seemed to me that the Georgian president and patriarch (in media quotes) were having to argue forcefully about their opposition to violence and their mutual support for peace. Face it: media publications need to sell stories in order to survive financially, and fighting sells, so they are not often interested in toning a story down. Media bias? Unavoidable. Avoiding their POV means not buying the story at face value. WP cannot provide the context that the sources themselves lack. We need other sources to give that. Hard to find for recent events.

Perspective? Georgia has fairly recently (historically) had to engage in war with Russia to obtain and maintain its independence. (Russian sources are likely to express a non-Georgian viewpoint.) Georgia is still trying to re-establish its own identity, and needs western support; hence its western-styled constitution. But it is a nation, with internal divisions like any other, and disagreements about law and its interpretation. Western journalism approaches an issue like freedom of religion from American or European secular notions, also quite legalistically (like Americans), expecting these ideas to be dominant. But Georgia is, after all, 85%+ Eastern Orthodox, dominant there, little understood here. The west does not examine its secular assumptions as foreign and/or unchristian pressure to be resisted. But the GOC is a church comprising most of the populace of Georgia. It does not react monolithically, neither is it the source of all disagreements within Georgian society. The Georgian national identity is Eastern Orthodox, whatever else it may be. "Religious" and "national" are not separate there the way they have become in America. An attempt to separate them may be viewed as foreign interference, even inimical. Consider (quote in the article) what Patriarch Ilia meant by "often the majority is more oppressed than the minority" in light of both Georgia's historical suppression by foreign powers and the fact of foreign pressures upon it right now. Western journalists don't provide that context; not even Georgian journalists do. Mostly, journalists are not paid to be reliable researchers.

Now, no view of mine will fix anything. But I'm certain that other viewpoints exist. They are not minority views or insignificant if they come mostly from Georgia (do they?), for the topic is about Georgia. But more important than views is context. The article will overcome the overwhelmingly western POV only when it references some reliable sources that can illuminate the clash with western values, sources which will certainly have to go deeper into the context of the topic. We must keep in mind that a western viewpoint is a minority one within this topic, though its significance is high as a reflection of the political and social pressures upon Georgia.

As for your own work on the article, Richwales, I think your attempts to maintain NPOV are valiant. This is unquestionably a difficult topic. If I couldn't point you to sources to look at, I hope I have at least provided some useful things to look for. Evensteven (talk) 21:32, 3 January 2014 (UTC)

Hi Rich. My first impression after reading the article is that the way it is structured it reads more like a list of religious problems/incidents involving the GOC rather than a representation of the topic of "Freedom of Religion in Georgia". The Muslim section is just a bevy of newspaper reports involving the GOC and the Muslims of the country but again it reads like a list of religious conflict incidents not suited to the Freedom of Religion topic but perhaps to a new article called "List of religious issues involving the GOC". To that I would add that the section on "Anti-homosexuality violence" is not related to Freedom of Religion but it is a political matter involving the GOC so I don't think it belongs in the article. Taking into consideration the structure of the article Freedom of religion in the United States as an example, we can perhaps add some of these incidents as "Case studies" but to add them they should involve the State of Georgia also, rather than any bilateral incidents involving the GOC and the other religions. Any bilateral incidents between GOC and any other religions should be added to a List article and perhaps referred to from the main article and that includes some incidents described in the "Other controversies" section, since some of these incidents involve Freedom of Expression issues, rather than Freedom of Religion, as for example the "Best Georgians television program" and the "hemorrhoids" incidents. Lastly since the title of the article refers to the State of Georgia it should be at least reorganised so that the initiatives of the Government be given priority in their presentation in the article and any reaction from GOC be added after the Government initiative/law is presented. I would also add that even bilateral issues between the GOC and the other religions can remain in the article if they are serious enough or demonstrate some longterm campaign of the GOC against its opponents. But I am not convinced isolated incidents of bilateral religious conflict picked from the news really belong in this article. Perhaps the more serious incidents can remain as case studies. I also liked the structure of the State Department report on Georgia There is information about the actions of the State of Georgia in "Section II. Status of Government Respect for Religious Freedom" and its subsections, which is more general in scope and provides better perspective of the overall issues than just a selection of new reports. I think I will make some minor edits to the article where I think some negative emphasis on GOC can be safely toned down. Obviously if you don't agree I will not mind and you can safely revert me. Take care. Δρ.Κ. ^{λόγοςπράξις} 04:47, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Given the dominant position of the Georgian Orthodox Church in the country's history and its post-Soviet evolution, I think it's going to be difficult to separate "religious issues involving the GOC" from "freedom of religion in Georgia" (especially post-Soviet Georgia). Freedom of religion involves numerous issues — including, without limitation, the ability of believers (whether Georgian Orthodox or adherents of other faiths) to worship as they wish; the ability of members of religious minorities, or followers of no faith, to live, work, and express themselves openly without risk of physical violence, social ostracism, job discrimination, etc.; and the extent to which any given religious organization (in this case, most obviously the GOC) is or ought to be able to impose its beliefs and practices on the community or the government. The discussion of the anti-LGBT violence of May 2013 may, I believe, be relevant here because it deals not only with the GOC's dominant role in Georgian society, but also with the degree to which a (probably mostly non-religious) minority is or is not tolerated, the level of protection which they do (or do not) receive from the government, and the extent to which counter-protests turned into protests against perceived societal domination by the GOC rather than specifically being pro-LGBT in character. So I do believe that most (if not all) of the existing material in the article can, via reasonable lines of argument, be connected to the overall subject of "freedom of religion in Georgia". I would certainly love to see the article expanded and have details filled in where possible, but there may be a problem of finding a sufficient variety of reliable sources — most available news outlets report primarily on conflicts, of course. — Richwales (no relation to Jimbo) 07:25, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

I think Δρ.Κ. makes several useful points about how various incidents relate differently and in different degree to "freedom of religion", particularly that freedom in Georgia. (No, it is not the same thing everywhere. Georgia the nation is not the United States, nor the United Kingdom.) But I especially like his observation of the article's structure as more like a list of incidents than a treatment of the topic. It is that underlying topic of religious freedom that serves as a connecting point of some (not all) of the incidents, and that topic needs coverage apart from the incidents. The incidents are not the thing that defines the topic; rather, the topic is the context in which the incidents occur. An article could exist without mention of the incidents. But they can be included as illustrative of the tensions involved in the working out of what "freedom of religion" means (here, what it means in Georgia specifically).

Rich, in your latest comments you give a list of connected "issues" that articulate a viewpoint quite common in the U.S., I think also in Britain, and found commonly in western media as well. You use phrases like "without limitation", "the ability", "openly without risk", and "to impose its beliefs". These phrases are typical of the manner in which the "issues" are loaded with WP:POV, and those same issues can be (must be) restated in a neutral manner for inclusion in WP. Biased sources can be quoted and used, but not so as to include bias. The various news organizations are supposed to be fact finders. Facts we can use. Biased colorations, even in sources, we cannot. It seems to me that there are ample quotes from your sources that make the grade in that regard, but care must be taken. To be neutral, it must also be recognized that proponents of one viewpoint do not have a monopoly on deciding what are issues and what are not. The western media is insufficient in identifying all the issues raised by freedom of religion because its own viewpoint usually defines what sets of things it is looking for. It's not that it is incapable of seeing more; it just doesn't always recognize the significance. But as I've said above, that's not its main job, and we need to recognize that.

To be neutral, we also need to recognize that Georgia does not share some American/western viewpoints and interpretations. WP (even English WP) is international enough to require that we editors rise above common American expectations that it should, which I as an American firmly declare is simply an arrogance. We do not want an article to become overly mired in descriptions of what meets with American approval and what doesn't, nor in what matches American presuppositions or doesn't. It must reflect the situation of Georgia, not American attitudes to Georgia. America does not have a monopoly on defining freedom; if Georgia does not decide to define it our way - oh, dear, get over it. But then reflect an NPOV description of the Georgian definition in the article. And that's some of the difficulty you've been having with your sources.

Another American viewpoint that Georgia does not share is the notion of separation of church and state. That does not mean that the GOC exercises political power normally invested in the state. But it does mean that the identity of the Georgian nation as experienced by its people binds together the government and the Eastern Orthodox religion; both are expressions of its nationhood. Like all such generalized expressions, it is not conveniently shared in the same measure or the same way by everyone, and some do not accept this identity as it stands. But overall the bond is strong, shared in good measure by most, and 85% identify with the GOC. Unlike America, it is a religious nation. And unlike America, it has spent most of its history dominated by foreign powers. (20+ years after Soviet domination? A drop in the bucket. Scan the last 1500 years and count how much time Georgia has had sovereignty over itself.) The GOC patriarch says "often the majority is more oppressed than the minority"; does the ordinary Georgian citizen not know this? - for the Georgian majority has seldom exercised power over itself. With more recent opportunities to do so, and the large-scale identification of Georgians with the GOC, just who is trying to impose what on whom, and by what right? Issues of state, government power, and religion are a complex mixture, but western influences that are not shared among the populace in Georgia are, in light of its history, seen as a mixture of influences also, and all of them foreign, with power attached. How receptive are Georgians to that? And how does that tie into the cited incidents?

The WP article must find an NPOV way to describe it all, the background, the complexity and intertwining, the non-westernness, in order to understand what are the real issues to Georgians. Simple answers are simply not answers at all. Current sources are insufficient for the purpose. But keep trying, Rich, because even relatively unknowledgeable I can see a great opportunity for a fine article here. I would say, mostly, that it's more sources that are needed, not fewer, and especially deeper.

I hope this expansion helps. It's a lot to cram into just a few words. Evensteven (talk) 22:28, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Thanks, Evensteven. I agree this is a complex issue, and I am not (at least not consciously or intentionally) pushing for a US-centric POV. There are certainly conflicting imperatives at work in modern, post-Rose Revolution Georgia — both the previous (UNM / Saakashvili) and current (Georgian Dream) government have been trying to fashion Georgia in the mould of a liberal western democracy as part of a push toward integration with and eventual membership in the European Union, while the Georgian Orthodox Church has been trying to make the most of its liberation from Soviet oppression and (as I see it) adopting a "never again" position not that terribly different from what has taken hold within many Orthodox communities elsewhere in the former USSR and Warsaw Pact. I would welcome pointers to additional high-quality sources for this article, as well as new contributors who may be more conversant than I am in Georgian and in Eastern Orthodoxy. Regarding the current set of sources, BTW, I should point out that Civil Georgia (civil.ge) is home-grown, based in Tbilisi, and I've been told by at least one Georgian journalist friend of mine that it is considered a reliable source. I've also been told by several Georgian friends that they consider this article (as it currently stands) to be giving a neutral and accurate accounting of the situation in their country — though I recognize it's extremely possible that these friends of mine, being journalists, may themselves have a natural leaning that is more pro-western / anti-establishment than Georgian society in general. — Richwales (no relation to Jimbo) 23:45, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

Thanks Evensteven. You have some very interesting viewpoints. Jaqeli (talk) 23:58, 7 January 2014 (UTC)

First, I wish to thank Evensteven for his nice words, and for his erudite comments which are always a pleasure to contemplate. Rich, you said: The discussion of the anti-LGBT violence of May 2013 may, I believe, be relevant here because it deals not only with the GOC's dominant role in Georgian society, but also with the degree to which a (probably mostly non-religious) minority is or is not tolerated, the level of protection which they do (or do not) receive from the government, and the extent to which counter-protests turned into protests against perceived societal domination by the GOC rather than specifically being pro-LGBT in character.. In my opinion this is exactly where the problem lies with the article. Especially your mention: and the extent to which counter-protests turned into protests against perceived societal domination by the GOC rather than specifically being pro-LGBT in character., "Societal domination by the GOC" when applied to non-religious topics, such as the suppresion of the gay people, is political in nature and it is not a topic suitable for a "Freedom of Religion" article. And protests against perceived societal domination by the GOC... are related to "Freedom from religion", which is a political issue, rather than "Freedom of religion", which is the topic of the article. The people simply wanted to be free from the oppression of the religious dogma as applied to their everyday lives, not their religion. Therefore this topic is a sociopolitical issue not a Religious Freedom issue. Consequently it adds to the anti-GOC slant of the article which in some places reads like an incident report against the GOC rather than a neutral Freedom of Religion article, especially when the incidents are primarily sociopolitical in nature. There is no doubt that GOC has a very dominant position in Georgian society. But to be unbiased we must at least concentrate on the impact of that dominance on religious issues and we must consciously separate them from the non-religious incidents, otherwise the article will become an incident list against the GOC. I will add some more comments about the other issues raised but I will concentrate on this topic first so as to keep this reply focused on one issue. Δρ.Κ. ^{λόγοςπράξις} 00:38, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Thanks all for your kind words. I tend to go along with Dr. K about the LGBT issue for the most part. The place where it does become religious is exactly that "freedom from religion" aspect, since LGBT sexual behavior runs directly counter to Orthodox teaching. The politicization of that issue is a direct attempt to promote a severing of state from church that itself runs counter to Georgian history. The GOC, by the very fact of not being the government, was often a primary support by which national identity there remained alive while its government was controlled by foreigners. So, among the Georgian populace, whether Orthodoxy is the primary consideration in their thinking, or a sense of homeland or nationhood, either way an LGBT presence in a situation rapidly becomes an issue of a minority arguing its position in concert with foreign influences that the populace can readily find reasons to resist. And resistance to severing the ties of church and state are very much a part of that. So while I agree with Dr. K that freedom from religion is not the direct topic of the article, religion itself is yet a part of LGBT issues, and freedom for the large majority to practice that religion in Georgia, in cooperation with the government, do rather make it into a matter of freedom of religion where it might not be otherwise. This is a perspective that has been shouted down repeatedly in the United States and England. The difference is that those are secular nations, not religious ones, and those societies do not support the practice of religion, nor do they wish continuance with their nations' historical ties to religion. I've got a computer power issue here: must go. Evensteven (talk) 02:59, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Fine, Evensteven. I can see your point so I will not argue this further. But I will introduce now two more topics covered in the article that I think are not related to Freedom of Religion, as I mentioned above, the "Best Georgians television program" and the "hemorrhoids" incidents. Of course if censorship based on religious grounds is within the scope of the Freedom of religion article, then there is no point arguing about these incidents either, except on the grounds as you mentioned above, that they constitute circumstantial evidence rather than documenting details of an overall systemic approach to Freedom of Religion. Δρ.Κ. ^{λόγοςπράξις} 05:04, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

I agree about those incidents. They intersect religion to a degree, but they don't bear on any central religious tenets. They show disrespect and bad taste, but I certainly don't think that qualifies them as notable with regard to freedom of religion. Evensteven (talk) 05:47, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Rich, it occurred to me that since journalistic research is mostly confined to the establishment of immediate facts around events, and not about putting causes or influences of incidents in context, that an overdependence on journalism for source material leads directly to the shortcomings of perspective we've discussed in the article. Scholarly research (whether or not done by academics) is a distinct type of research especially called for in addressing those shortcomings. To that end, it occurred to me that finding some Georgian historians and their writings might be in order, and I did a little browsing for Georgian institutions where they might function professionally. It turns out that WP itself also has some pointers to offer.

The University of Georgia (Tbilisi) appears to be a recently-established institution that is trying to meet pragmatic educational needs in the nation. Much of its orientation is designed to learn what it can from the west, so it may not have as much to offer in the way of specifically Georgian perspectives. Nevertheless, one of its principal aims is to divorce modern Georgian schooling from the Communist ideology, indoctrination, and propaganda to which it was subject for some 80 years under the Soviets. It is not too much to say that Christianity also suffered the worst persecutions in its 2000-year history under that regime, so even while the GOC does not (superficially) seem to have much influence on the development of this university, the drive to re-establish the full national identity may be just as operant in this secular arena as in the GOC.

Tbilisi State University was founded in Tbilisi in 1918 by a prominent Georgian historian, Ivane Javakhishvili, and might thus have greater access to Georgian traditions, with their own perspectives. It also has close contacts with many universities in the west, but also in Poland, Greece, Iran, and Egypt, which could produce a better balance. It has a school of the humanities, among whose current faculty is Giuli Alasania, a recognized expert in the history and culture of Georgia, and who has written extensively. She also has ties to the Georgian National Academy of Sciences, and happens to be the mother of the Georgian president.

WP also provides a List of universities in Georgia (country) and the category "Historians from Georgia (country)" from which leads may be developed. The Georgian National Museum may also provide help and sources. Meanwhile, the Roman Catholic website CNEWA, http://www.cnewa.us/default.aspx?ID=21&pagetypeID=9&sitecode=US&pageno=1 , provides a short English summary of Georgian church history. The website of the patriarchate of the GOC, although it is in Georgian, is at "http://www.patriarchate.ge". Perhaps Google translate or some such tool might be of assistance. The main thing is that sources related to the church might be traced through them. Evensteven (talk) 19:50, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Thanks for the above. FYI, Google Translate does an utterly abominable job with Georgian text. My own command of Georgian is, unfortunately, still very elementary, though I'm continuing to study it.

I also want to say here that I still believe that reports of GOC pressure or interference with the practice of other religions (or with secularist views or practices falling under the category of "freedom from religion") are legitimately relevant to the subject of freedom of religion. In this regard, I believe that the material in our general article on Freedom of religion supports my position. I acknowledge we have a disagreement here, and that my view appears to be in the minority in this current discussion. I don't intend to edit-war here in defiance of a contrary consensus, but I also don't plan to drop the issue forever either (recognizing that consensus can change). And since the "freedom of religion" subject is arguably broader than just Georgia, or just Eastern Orthodoxy, I will probably bring up the question in other fora (such as the general religion and/or human rights wikiprojects) and see what people there have to say. Ultimately, we may eventually have to end up "civilly agreeing to disagree". — Richwales (no relation to Jimbo) 21:05, 8 January 2014 (UTC)

Rich, let's get real. What is this talk about edit-warring? I came to this forum, after your kind invitation, to advise you upon your request that I do so. Therefore I consider myself a guest in this discussion. What kind of a guest would I be if I started a fight with the person who invited me? It's like inviting someone to dinner for a nice conversation and then end up exchanging blows at the dinner table. Believe me, this is not my style. Nor will it ever be. This is an article you largely wrote, you edited it, did most of the work, then you asked for honest advice and I strove to provide it, in an honest, direct way. It is up to you to accept it or reject it, but obviously edit-warring over it, never entered my mind until you mentioned it. I am disappointed. I never would have expected you would consider me such an impolite guest. In any case, my respect for you remains undiminished and I consider this a minor event in the grand scheme of things. I would also like to thank Evensteven for the scholarship of his comments and his astute analysis of the article architecture. Whatever the misunderstandings, this was an exchange that I greatly enjoyed. I have to thank you for inviting me to participate. If you need my advice again, please do not hesitate to ask me. Remember, I still consider you a great friend. And before I forget, I concentrated on the article's weak points as I perceived them. That does not imply that the whole article is weak. There are many sections that are excellent and the whole article is well written. You did a great job at rewriting it. But my advice, driven by the necessity of improving the article, focused on the weak points, not the great points, of which there are many. Take care. Δρ.Κ. ^{λόγοςπράξις} 01:48, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Dr.K, I think you misunderstood me, and I apologize for being unclear. (That's one of the potential problems with trying to communicate in a text medium like e-mail or Wikipedia talk pages.) When I said I still held to my view, I felt I needed to be extremely clear — to you, Evensteven, and anyone else who might come along to read all this — that despite any disagreement, I remain committed to a civil discussion. That's all I meant. Sorry that it apparently came across wrong. — Richwales (no relation to Jimbo) 03:23, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Thank you Rich for your reply, but there is no reason for commitments of civility in a pleasant academic discussion between friends. No need for apologies either. Remember, we are still at the dinner table having a friendly conversation. Do you see any of the guests nervously looking over their shoulders? I don't; in fact such eventuality wouldn't even cross my mind. :) Δρ.Κ. ^{λόγοςπράξις} 04:29, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Oh yes, folks; let me echo Dr. K - indeed, both of you. I hope I have not in any way appeared uncivil either; nothing of the kind intended. And even if our wavelengths are not exactly matched, from my perspective "disagreement" is far too strong an assessment. Truly, I think we're pretty close. I think we all eventually landed in about the same place on the LGBT matter, and when we come to the TV program and the "hemorrhoids" incidents, I just think they're relatively insubstantial in comparison and should be examined for notability: not notability with regards to reportability in the media, but in terms of impact on the article topic. And that's really a judgment call about where you draw lines, not an issue of principle. On my part, I think enough's said there, and I am content to let you make the call, Rich. Let me echo Dr. K's praise of your work on the article and on its present strengths. I didn't see what it was like before you began, but I can still see the quality that is there now, and I highly respect the amount of toil that a rewrite entails. It's in the nature of the beast that, to seek possible improvements, one focusses on weak points and insufficiencies, so that's the content of my comments in a nutshell, but not the balanced content of my overall opinion.

I do still hope you have patience and time to track down a more scholastic source or two, for reasons I've already given. But we'd do well to remember one more thing: that distortion, misrepresentation, and innuendo are well-known propaganda tools. Those tools raise emotional levels and reduce rationality, and the innocent can easily fall victim. That is why the more vocal and rabid elements on opposing sides resort to them so readily, and it makes highly reportable reading. But it's not good for encyclopedic articles. Anything that serves to reveal distortions for what they are, or refrains from repeating innuendo, serves to preserve neutrality and balance. Editing counts for a lot. Scholastic research and context can both be helpful in that regard too, and tend to promote a reader's understanding. So perhaps there's a crux of my observations in another light, too.

My thanks to both of you for your kindness and patience, and actual hearing of my opinions. I'm very pleased and gratified to hear they might be of benefit. And for me too, it's been a pleasure thinking and writing about the article and the issues and discussing it all with you both.

P.S. Is my etymology correct in this? - There is no "cussing" in "discussing"; that's why it's called dis-cussing. ;) Evensteven (talk) 10:10, 9 January 2014 (UTC)

Cussing in an academic discussion about Freedom of Religion? God forbid. :) Δρ.Κ. ^{λόγοςπράξις} 17:51, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

Things are not always the way they "Otto" be

Check out WP:OTTO. Something to bear in mind. Evensteven (talk) 19:32, 30 January 2014 (UTC)

AfD on The Byzantine Patriarchal See and Orthodox Church of Hungary

The article The Byzantine Patriarchal See and Orthodox Church of Hungary has been put up for deletion as a potential hoax. All interested users are kindly invited to participate and voice their opinion. --Constantine ✍ 17:31, 4 May 2014 (UTC)

Repaired wikilink in previous edit. Evensteven (talk) 20:18, 4 May 2014 (UTC)

Article was deleted as a blatant hoax. -Ad Orientem (talk) 02:37, 6 May 2014 (UTC)

Historicity of Jesus

Additional eyes would be very welcome on the above article and its talk page.John Carter (talk) 23:29, 21 August 2014 (UTC)

At Reference desk/humanities

I recently asked about an Eastern canonic version at Wikipedia:Reference_desk/Humanities#Greek_orthodox_bible. Got some nice answers but maybe someone from here will have something to add. trespassers william (talk) 20:58, 15 September 2014 (UTC)

Comment on the WikiProject X proposal

Hello there! As you may already know, most WikiProjects here on Wikipedia struggle to stay active after they've been founded. I believe there is a lot of potential for WikiProjects to facilitate collaboration across subject areas, so I have submitted a grant proposal with the Wikimedia Foundation for the "WikiProject X" project. WikiProject X will study what makes WikiProjects succeed in retaining editors and then design a prototype WikiProject system that will recruit contributors to WikiProjects and help them run effectively. Please review the proposal here and leave feedback. If you have any questions, you can ask on the proposal page or leave a message on my talk page. Thank you for your time! (Also, sorry about the posting mistake earlier. If someone already moved my message to the talk page, feel free to remove this posting.) Harej (talk) 22:47, 1 October 2014 (UTC)

St. Josaphat Kuntsevych Controversy

IP 188.129.90.247 has been aggressively editing the article on Josaphat Kuntsevych, a canonized Catholic saint. After making several obviously POV attempts to edit the article w/o sources he has added one. Unfortunately the source is a polemically anti-Catholic website which I doubt passes WP:RS. Further a good chunk of the most recent edit looks like a copy and paste. That said, some of the claims may be legitimate and there are original sources quoted. Kuntsevych is a VERY controversial figure among Eastern Orthodox Christians. See the talk page. Currently I am unable to revert any of his edits due to 3RR. A look from other editors would be appreciated. -Ad Orientem (talk) 04:29, 10 November 2014 (UTC)

Made a reply at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Christianity/Noticeboard, where discussion can continue. Evensteven (talk) 01:52, 11 November 2014 (UTC)

Thanks. There is an ongoing discussion on the talk page of the article. Some of the broader problems go back a ways. -Ad Orientem (talk) 02:02, 11 November 2014 (UTC)

Thanks. I redirected my discussion over to the article talk page also. Evensteven (talk) 03:45, 11 November 2014 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:Pescetarianism#Transforming an "Eastern Orthodox" usage to a "Byzantine Rite" usage

You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Pescetarianism#Transforming an "Eastern Orthodox" usage to a "Byzantine Rite" usage. Thanks. Elizium23 (talk) 21:41, 19 December 2014 (UTC)