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New Monastery in the United States!

GirgisantonyGirgisantony
in Coptic Orthodox Church
Pope Tawadrous along with Anba David and Anba Karas announced that a new monastery will be established in the Boston area. It will be named after St Mary and Pope Kyrillos IV. The link below is to a video of the announcement.


Comments

  • minasolimanminasoliman
    edited October 2017
    Pope Kyrillos the fourth?

    Is that why all the priests were summoned to Egypt, or were there other things on the Pope’s agenda mentioned?
  • minatasgeelminatasgeel
    @minasoliman...the priests were not summoned to egypt, but they did the first "Northeastern USA Priests Convention" just because the Pope cancelled his visit that was supposed to take place this month. 
  • GirgisantonyGirgisantony
    I meant the sixth VI
  • minasolimanminasoliman
    @minatasgeel

    Thank you. I just found it a bit odd that if this was an olive branch, it’s a strange one to give and there had to be a more vexing reason.
  • Tobit
    edited October 2017
    Glory to God for his new monastery and lets pray for the endeavor. 
  • minatasgeelminatasgeel
    @minasoliman...if this trip proves anything, it would be that the Pope's trip to our area may be delayed longer than expected. 
  • minasolimanminasoliman
    I understand one of the reasons of the delay is his upcoming back surgery.  If it's going to be a very serious surgery from what I studied, and not a simple procedure, then I can understand the delay will be much longer, and he probably will not be in the public scene for a very long time, probably delegating a locum tenens until his recovery.
  • RemnkemiRemnkemi
    Let's take this opportunity to discuss ecclesiology. 

    Being from Boston, I can tell it is a great place to have a monastery....

    However....

    Monasteries in general seem to be an oddity in ecclesiology. They start out independent. Then sometimes they get their own bishop (when it is officially recognized) and other times they become annexed to the surrounding diocese and the diocesean bishop becomes the abbot (which may or may not be a violation of canons)

    For example, St Anthony's monastery in California had a bishop then it was annexed into the LA diocese where Met Serapion is now the abbot. The Texas monastery, on the other hand, started under the SUS diocese and Bishop Youssef was always the abbot.

    Patmos monastery has monks but no bishop. 

    Ohio convent (I forget the name) is unofficially under a bishop but again no diocese and no bishop.

    And of course, we have St Shenouda monastery in Rochester that has neither monks nor a bishop (and I don't even know how HGBD sees it)

    So in Boston, we have an independent church that is becoming a monastery inside a diocese but the message says nothing about who will be the abbot or if it will end up like SUS and LA monasteries (ie, annexed into the diocese) or if it will remain independent like Wadi Natrun monasteries.

    So I guess my question is how do monasteries fit into ecclesiology? It seems to be all over the place. I don't know if there is a similar situation in Australia, Europe or even Egypt regarding starting monasteries and how they fit within dioceses. 
  • Daniel_Kyrillos
    @Remnkemi also, St. Demiana's convent in Georgia has an abbottess, but they have a cell saved for Anba Youssef there since he visits often.
  • minatasgeelminatasgeel
    @Remenkemi...there are a couple of small monasteries that are like Texas situation...where they are part of the diocese, the abbot is the bishop of the diocese, but it still would have a "robbita" taking care of everything. We don't hear bout them because they are, as i said, small.
  • RemnkemiRemnkemi
    So are we saying that the proper ecclesiology of monastaries is for them to be annexed to the diocese and the diocesan bishop is the abbot? 

    If yes, then why doesn't this apply to ancient monasteries like St Antony, Scetis, St Mina, St Shenoute, etc?  

    Does this also mean that the late Anba Karas in St Antony in California was an aberration? Are we to conclude that St Antony in California should have always been under Met Serapion, not given its own bishop? 

    What is the situation in Europe and Australia? Separate bishops or diocesan bishops as head of monasteries?


  • minatasgeelminatasgeel
    I don't think we are saying anything other then both cases are acceptable. I think this is hard to consider without a deep look into how monasteries were through the centuries--they were not as isolated as they are now and many of them were in the middle of cities, wiwth easier access to the believers....The monastery in Jerusalem comes to mind and the ones in Old Egypt. Also, Anba Roweis El-abbaseya, that was a monastery. Were those under the care of the bishop of the diocese or were they just considered another church with a more specific service towards monks or nuns?!
  • andrew_taniosandrew_tanios
    A bit late to the party, apologies!


    Concerning Australia, I'll only comment on the St Shenouda Monastery just outside Sydney.

    This monastery was established some 20 odd years ago (around 1995) by Fr Tadros Malaty, before the Diocese of Sydney came into existence. It was under the spiritual direction of HG Bishop Sarapamon which meant it was effectively annexed to St Bishoy's Monastery in Egypt.

    This was the case until until HG Bishop Daniel was ordained Bishop and Abbott of the monastery in 2009.
    (Note: HG is not to be confused with HG Bishop Daniel of the Diocese of Sydney and its surrounds)
  • GirgisantonyGirgisantony
    @andrew_tanios 

    He was talking about St. Shenouda Monastery in upstate New York, USA.  
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