The Greek Orthodox Church belongs to Eastern Orthodox Christianity. It shares doctrine and sacramental life with other Eastern Orthodox churches while expressing that faith through Greek historical, liturgical, and cultural traditions.
What “Greek Orthodox” means
The term can refer to several Orthodox jurisdictions with Greek heritage, including the Church of Greece, the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, and Greek Orthodox communities in the diaspora. Eastern Orthodoxy is not governed by one worldwide pope. Its churches are led by bishops and organized through a communion of local churches.
Core beliefs
Greek Orthodox Christians confess the Trinity, the divinity and humanity of Jesus Christ, his death and resurrection, the authority of scripture within Holy Tradition, the importance of the ecumenical councils, and the hope of resurrection and eternal life.
Salvation is commonly described in terms of communion with God and theosis, or participation in divine life by grace. This does not mean that human beings become God by nature.
Divine Liturgy
The Eucharistic service is called the Divine Liturgy. The Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom is used most often, while other liturgies are used at particular times. Worship includes scripture, litanies, hymns, incense, processions, icons, and Holy Communion.
Sacraments and church life
Orthodox Christians commonly speak of baptism, chrismation, Eucharist, confession, marriage, ordination, and holy unction as major mysteries or sacraments. Orthodoxy does not always limit sacramental life to a rigid numerical scheme.
Infants may receive baptism, chrismation, and Communion. Monasticism also has an important place in Orthodox spirituality.
Icons
Icons of Christ, Mary the Theotokos, saints, angels, and biblical events are prominent in Orthodox churches. Orthodox teaching distinguishes veneration offered to sacred images from worship, which is directed to God. The Seventh Ecumenical Council played a major role in defining this distinction.
Church leadership
Bishops oversee dioceses, priests serve local parishes, and deacons assist in liturgical and pastoral work. The Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople holds a position of honor in Eastern Orthodoxy but does not exercise the same universal jurisdiction claimed for the pope in Roman Catholicism.
Today, Greek Orthodox life includes the Church of Greece, the Ecumenical Patriarchate and its jurisdictions, and communities throughout the diaspora. These bodies share Eastern Orthodox faith and sacramental communion, but they are not one centralized worldwide organization.
After the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople in 1453, the Ecumenical Patriarchate remained a major institution for Orthodox Christians under Ottoman rule. In the nineteenth century, after Greek independence, the Church of Greece became autocephalous; its canonical independence was formally recognized by the Ecumenical Patriarchate in 1850.
The separation between Greek-speaking Eastern Christianity and the Latin West developed gradually. The events of 1054 are often used as a conventional date for the East–West Schism, but political, linguistic, liturgical, and jurisdictional conflicts had accumulated over centuries and continued afterward.
Greek Orthodox history cannot be reduced to the modern nation of Greece. Christianity developed early in the Greek-speaking eastern Mediterranean, and Constantinople became one of the major sees of the Roman and later Byzantine Christian world. The ecumenical councils of the first millennium, Greek-speaking theologians, monastic movements, and Byzantine liturgy all shaped what later became Eastern Orthodox Christianity.
Historical development
Greek heritage and wider Orthodoxy
Greek language and Byzantine history shaped much of Orthodox theology and worship, but Eastern Orthodoxy is not limited to Greek ethnicity. Orthodox Christians also belong to Arab, Slavic, Romanian, Georgian, African, Asian, Western, and other communities.
The Greek Orthodox tradition is therefore both part of the wider Eastern Orthodox Church and a distinctive historical expression of Orthodox Christianity.
