OCA Acknowledges Alaska Crisis

Date Published: 2/23/2008

Publication: OCA.org

OCA Chancellor issues statement regarding Diocese of Alaska

SYOSSET, NY [OCA Communications] — Archpriest Alexander Garklavs, Chancellor of the Orthodox Church in America, has released the following comment regarding the Diocese of Alaska.

“The OCA Chancery is receiving mail and e-mail from clergy of the Diocese of Alaska. There are indications that serious issues exist that may need to be addressed. His Beatitude, Metropolitan Herman is aware of the situation and has been in touch with His Grace, Bishop Nikolai and members of the Holy Synod. We would also like to correct a news item which appeared on the internet. The resignation of the two Metropolitan Council Representatives from the Diocese of Alaska was in fact communicated in a letter from His Grace, Bishop Nikolai to His Beatitude, Metropolitan Herman. In January, Archimandrite Isidore and Minadora Jacobs had submitted their resignations to Bishop Nikolai, who blessed their requests and subsequently notified Metropolitan Herman about this last week.”

Alaskan Sexual Harrassment Charges; Professor Calls On Bishops to Resign

A sexual misconduct complaint had been made against a high ranking Orthodox official. This news has been reported in over fifty leading newspapers in recent days. According to one news report:

Paul Sidebottom, the former acting Dean of Students at St. Herman’s Seminary in Kodiak, Alaska, has filed a complaint with the Federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) against the OCA Bishop of Alaska, Nikolai (Soraich) and his Chancellor, Archimandrite Isidore (Brittain) alleging sexual harassment and retaliatory discharge. According to a press release from Sidebottom’s lawyer, James Spencer of Hinkle Elkouri LLC of Wichita, Kansas, issued yesterday:

“The EEOC complaint alleges that Archimandrite Isidore sexually harassed Sidebottom in May 2007. The EEOC complaint goes on to allege that Bishop Nikolai and Archimandrite Isidore caused Sidebottom to be fired from his job at St. Herman’s Theological Seminary in retaliation for Sidebottom’s filing of a sexual harassment complaint with Metropolitan HERMAN, the highest ranking official of the Orthodox Church in America.” source

A later news report from the Kodiak Daily Mirror had this to say:

Terenty Dushkin Suspended After Tsunami of Public Outrage

Date Published: 2/5/2008

Publication: OCA website

In an announcement today, February 5, 2008, the Orthodox Church of America announced that Bishop Nikolai of Alaska suspended Reader Terenty Dushkin, a convicted sex offender, some two weeks ago, on January 17th, 2008.

Dushkin, whose tonsuring as a Reader on December 9, 2007, provoked a media storm of outrage, was suspended from “any and all ministerial duties in any parish of the OCA” in “accordance with the canons”.

Articles about Dushkin’s ordination were reported on Pokrov.org, OrthodoxReform.org, and the Anchorage Daily News. For background, read more about Terenty’s ordination.

The full statement by the OCA reads as follows:

Rod Dreher: The treason of the bishops

Rod Dreher, former Roman Catholic, now an Orthodox convert, posted an article on his blog which speaks very frankly about the current sex scandals within the Orthodox church.

First he gives some background:

Some readers are aware that the Orthodox Church in America, my church, is undergoing a huge scandal now centered on the hierarchy — especially Metropolitan Herman and his coterie at church headquarters. It involves money, mostly, but also — it has been alleged — sexual impropriety of some of the players. The scandal has been going on for quite some time, and the bishops, being bishops, cannot or will not take decisive action to clean out the Augean stables. source

Dreher commends the OCA’s reform movement:

I must say, though, how impressed I am with the laity and some of the clergy of the OCA, who are in open revolt against the hierarchy. Read, for example, this recent thread on OCANews. People aren’t willing to sit silently and let the bishops destroy the Church by their dithering, their weakness and inaction (to say nothing of the kind of corruption that led the Diocese of Alaska recently to ordain to minor clerical orders a convicted child molester; did these people learn nothing from the public agony of the Catholic Church in recent years?!). source

Dreher quotes Phil Lawler, “a very brave and faithful orthodox Catholic journalist, and a friend,” who made several insightful comments in his new book, “The Faithful Departed,” Lawler comments on the Roman Catholic sexual misconduct scandal, from which Orthodox readers should take note. Lawler points out the real problem — the “treason of the bishops.” He points out “loving the church means denouncing the corruption.” The full quote: