Fr. John Chryssavgis to speak at the Inaugural Orthodox Canon Law Society of North America Conference held at Maliotis Cultural Center of HCHC on Saturday, October 19, 2024. The title of his paper is Physical Disability and Priestly Ordination.
Fr. John’s paper explores and establishes a canonical basis for the ordination— potentially to all three degrees, but practically and preliminarily to the diaconate—of individuals with disabilities in the Orthodox Church. In other words, and in reverse perspective, the intention of the proposal is potentially to eliminate and exclude any canonical impediment to the expansion of priestly orders to people with disabilities.
The first part of the paper considers the fundamental source of canonical regulations as these are found in the corpus of eighty-five canons that have come to be known to us as the Apostolic Canons. In the second part of the paper, the emphasis is on historical and theological, as well as liturgical and spiritual perspectives of the question. The paper closes with a personal commentary related to canons on the ordination of individuals with disabilities. The conclusion is that the church draws on its pastoral experience and practice to determine how the canonical tradition should be interpreted and applied in specific circumstances and cases.”
HEI On the Road | Orthodox Canon Law Conference 2024: Fr. Chryssavgis on Disability
