Can non-Armenians become priests?

TheLostCoin

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I was asking a close friend of mine, who is an Eastern Orthodox seminarian, about his opinions about Oriental Orthodoxy, and while discussing the jurisdictional problems, he brought up the fact that the Armenians are such an enclosed ethnic group weary of outsiders that they forbid non-Armenians / converts from becoming priests. Understandable if this is the case of course, despite the fact that I obviously don’t agree with it (after all, Severus of Antioch was from the region of Bulgaria, and as a former pagan, become one of the most influential Syriac theologians).

However, I have not read anything online saying or denying it, and even come across forum posts about converts wanting to become Armenian priests and the Armenian Orthodox seeming to have no problem with it.

It of course could be an informal rule, where a bishop will always deny a non-Armenian ordination, but I can’t find any evidence of this.

So, could someone clarify this please? Thank you.
 

dzheremi

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I am not an Armenian, but I have never heard that they restrict their priesthood only to ethnic Armenians, and from what I have been able to find online (dated back quite a ways in internet years -- September 1994), your friend is mistaken. See the following very interesting interview with one ex-Baptist Tim Robinson on his discerning the call to become a priest in the Armenian Church after he and his wife converted to it (neither are of Armenian ancestry), found in Acrag's Blog's scan of Window (some kind of Armenian Church studies periodical?), Vol. IV, No. 3 (1994), where it appears under the title "Knocking at the Door: A conversation with Tim Robinson on his thoughts about becoming an Armenian priest" by Arlene Boyd:

https://acrag.wordpress.com/1994/09/03/non-armenians-in-the-armenian-church-vol-4-no-3/
 
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Silverback

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I am not an Armenian, but I have never heard that they restrict their priesthood only to ethnic Armenians, and from what I have been able to find online (dated back quite a ways in internet years -- September 1994), your friend is mistaken. See the following very interesting interview with one ex-Baptist Tim Robinson on his discerning the call to become a priest in the Armenian Church after he and his wife converted to it (neither are of Armenian ancestry), found in Acrag's Blog's scan of Window (some kind of Armenian Church studies periodical?), Vol. IV, No. 3 (1994), where it appears under the title "Knocking at the Door: A conversation with Tim Robinson on his thoughts about becoming an Armenian priest" by Arlene Boyd:

Non Armenians in the Armenian Church, Vol. 4, No. 3

If it is a restriction, then it is probably one of those unwritten understandings. However, I would bet it only applies within the borders of Armenia, or, in areas close by with large Ethnic Armenian populations. In the larger diaspera, eliminating local populations would be problematic at best.
 
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MariaJLM

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From what I've heard they won't even permit converts period except for those who married ethnic Armenians. Like, if a person wants to commune at a Armenian church then they pretty much have to convert in any of the Non-Armenian OO churches and then go to an Armenian church.
 
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dzheremi

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From what I've heard they won't even permit converts period except for those who married ethnic Armenians. Like, if a person wants to commune at a Armenian church then they pretty much have to convert in any of the Non-Armenian OO churches and then go to an Armenian church.

This is incorrect. Please read the link in post #2 for one such example of two non-Armenians with no ties whatsoever to Armenia or the Armenian Church who converted together, one of which was at the time of the interview discerning the priesthood. It would be a little strange for them to allow non-Armenian converts to discern a calling to the priesthood in their Church if they didn't accept converts period.


Other things to consider:

"Before Your First Visit to an Armenian Orthodox Church" (opens as PDF), adapted by Rev. Fr. Ghevond Ajamian from the pamphlet "Before Your First Visit to an Orthodox Church" by Frederica Mathewes-Green. Note especially point 12: "Many may feel when they come to an Armenian Church that because of the different language, customs and traditions, the Armenian Church is only for Armenians: this is not true. The Armenian Church, which was founded by two apostles of Christ, Saints Thaddeus and Bartholomew, was established for Christ and all Christians – Armenian and non-Armenian. All are welcome to worship in the Armenian Church."

St. James Armenian Apostolic Church of Sacramento -- front page statement: "St. James Armenian Apostolic Church-Sacramento welcomes members and visitors to join us in worship and celebration. Our church hosts families from a variety of backgrounds and experiences." (I'm not even sure what "a variety of experiences" means, but the important point is what is not found -- i.e., it doesn't say "No non-Armenians, please.")

Fr. Krikor Maksoudian notes in his talk on religion in post-Soviet Armenia for the fifth annual Vardanants Day Armenian lecture held at the Library of Congress in 1997 that "there are also a very small number of non-Armenians in Armenia who are members of the Armenian Church", which is significant given the near-homogeneity of the Armenian state: the Republic of Armenia is 98.1% ethnically Armenian, so the number of non-Armenian anythings in Armenia is going to be very small -- and yet there they are anyway. As with the rest of this post, the point is that you wouldn't find this if the Armenian Apostolic Church really didn't accept non-Armenians, as opposed to just being very strongly identified with the Armenian people, and they with it (same as the Greek Church and the Greeks, the Serbian Church and the Serbs, the Maronite Church and the Lebanese, the Malankara churches -- Orthodox and non -- and the Malayali Indians, etc).
 
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TheLostCoin

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This is incorrect. Please read the link in post #2 for one such example of two non-Armenians with no ties whatsoever to Armenia or the Armenian Church who converted together, one of which was at the time of the interview discerning the priesthood. It would be a little strange for them to allow non-Armenian converts to discern a calling to the priesthood in their Church if they didn't accept converts period.


Other things to consider:

"Before Your First Visit to an Armenian Orthodox Church" (opens as PDF), adapted by Rev. Fr. Ghevond Ajamian from the pamphlet "Before Your First Visit to an Orthodox Church" by Frederica Mathewes-Green. Note especially point 12: "Many may feel when they come to an Armenian Church that because of the different language, customs and traditions, the Armenian Church is only for Armenians: this is not true. The Armenian Church, which was founded by two apostles of Christ, Saints Thaddeus and Bartholomew, was established for Christ and all Christians – Armenian and non-Armenian. All are welcome to worship in the Armenian Church."

St. James Armenian Apostolic Church of Sacramento -- front page statement: "St. James Armenian Apostolic Church-Sacramento welcomes members and visitors to join us in worship and celebration. Our church hosts families from a variety of backgrounds and experiences." (I'm not even sure what "a variety of experiences" means, but the important point is what is not found -- i.e., it doesn't say "No non-Armenians, please.")

Fr. Krikor Maksoudian notes in his talk on religion in post-Soviet Armenia for the fifth annual Vardanants Day Armenian lecture held at the Library of Congress in 1997 that "there are also a very small number of non-Armenians in Armenia who are members of the Armenian Church", which is significant given the near-homogeneity of the Armenian state: the Republic of Armenia is 98.1% ethnically Armenian, so the number of non-Armenian anythings in Armenia is going to be very small -- and yet there they are anyway. As with the rest of this post, the point is that you wouldn't find this if the Armenian Apostolic Church really didn't accept non-Armenians, as opposed to just being very strongly identified with the Armenian people, and they with it (same as the Greek Church and the Greeks, the Serbian Church and the Serbs, the Maronite Church and the Lebanese, the Malankara churches -- Orthodox and non -- and the Malayali Indians, etc).

Well, I wouldn’t know because I haven’t had a long-standing experience with the Armenian Church - again, I’m going off of the experience of a friend who has friends inquiring into the Armenian Church, so I’m glad to see that, at least at a more official level, they aren’t ethnophyletes (to use an EO term, as a Council from the 19th century of the EO Church condemned the identification of the Church with the Nation as a heresy called “ethnophyletism”).

But I wonder if it’s an informal norm to discourage non-Armenian converts and to discourage non-Armenians from the Priesthood.

I mean, for all intensive purposes, most police organizations have tried to make it clear, at an official level, that racial profiling - using skin color to make quick assumptions - is not allowed.

At an informal level...I don’t think many policemen follow that rule at all.
 
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TheLostCoin

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I think all ethnic Churches in all communions have this problem to some degree - it’s inevitable due to human nature in wanting to be close to those who are like you culturally.

But I’ve heard things like it’s bad with the Armenian Church - which, if it is, that’s a shame, cause again, I think that the Armenians have a rich culture and story to share with the world.
 
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dzheremi

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Well I can't speak to the reality of what the friends of your friends may or may not be experiencing. I'm only meaning to answer the original question of the OP, which is definitively answered by the example of the Armenian Church having convert priests, such as the gentleman in the magazine interview.

And in my subsequent reply to MariaLMJ, the point again isn't to say one thing or another about any particular situation, but to point out that if it were the Church itself banning such things (as opposed to the reception anyone may get at any particular parish), you wouldn't find any such examples.

You know, I've heard some horror stories about ROCOR, the Greek Church, traditional Catholics, etc., but how much any of those represent the entire churches which they are examples of is definitely a matter for some discussion. I personally have only ever been very heartily welcomed at the local OCA back in my home area of Northern California, which I used to visit yearly for several years in a row before converting to Orthodoxy, but maybe a more self-consciously 'ethnic' jurisdiction or parish wouldn't have welcomed me (this one has Greeks, Arabs, Slavs, Eritreans, white Americans, etc.); is the fact that I was welcomed to the OCA's credit, or the credit of their Russian mother church, or to that individual parish (maybe aided by its makeup)? What about those who are not so welcomed? I know that exists too, because I have heard as much from converts to the Eastern Orthodox Church not of traditionally 'Orthodox' backgrounds.

You are right, of course, that every 'ethnic' church faces this to one degree or another. One thing I will say about the Armenians is that I have noticed that they are resistant to translating their liturgies into non-Armenian languages for worship -- you can certainly find translations of those liturgical texts into other languages (and have been able to for a very long time, in fact), but the worship itself is almost always in Armenian (from what I understand in Classical Armenian, at that), which no doubt presents a rather formidable obstacle in attracting and keeping non-Armenian converts. The explanation I have been given by Armenians online when I have brought this fact (which so far none of them have disputed) is that the genocides killed some ~90% of their entire clergy and sent the vast majority of their people into various worldwide diasporas, so there is a lot more focus on the Church as a transmitter of identity, including language, since their entire people and Church were almost wiped out. That makes sense to me as a historical explanation, but I don't think it's an explanation they'll be able to rely on forever; they'll have to do what the other OO churches have already done and begin to also have English or mixed-language liturgies in the West (and I do have a CD around here somewhere that has the deacon's responses in English, which I guess is a good step in the right direction). I believe the sooner they do this, the better. It would not surprise me if it were not already underway somewhere and I just don't know about it.
 
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