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St. Raphael, Bishop of Brooklyn and the Dream of Orthodox Unity in America [Spring -Summer 2000] Over Memorial Day Weekend (May 27-29), Orthodoxy in America celebrated at St. Tikhon’s Monastery, South Canaan, Pennsylvania the glorification of St. Raphael, bishop of Brooklyn. During the canonization services Bishop Basil (Essey) mentioned that St. Raphael, being in America at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th centuries, "understood" proper canonical order. He went on to say that St. Raphael lived at a time when Orthodox Christians in America "breathed the same air," and their hearts "beat with the same rhythm" of unity. Here are the greetings delivered by then Archimandrite Raphael, on December 13, 1898, on the arrival of Archbishop Tikhon, the representative of the Russian Orthodox Church designated to head the American Church, to the Russian Church of St. Nicholas in New York City: Blessed is he that comes in the name of the Lord. May our Lord Jesus Christ, through the prayers of the holy
Nicholas of Myra in Lycia and Tikhon of Zadonsk, help Your Grace in this your
new archpastoral [from: Leonid Kishkovsky, "Archbishop Tikhon in America," St. Vladimir’s Theological Quarterly, vol. 19, no. 1, 1975, p. 10.] |
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