GREECE, THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN

The Hellenic Republic, or Greece, is a peninsular region located in southern Europe bound on the north by the former Yugoslavian Republic of Macedonia and Bulgaria, on the northeast by Turkey, on the east by the Aegean Sea, on the southeast by the Sea of Crete, on the south by the Mediterranean Sea, on the west by the Ionian Sea, and on the northwest by Albania. A mountainous country with ranges transforming into small islands at the coast, Greece has a temperate climate, characterized by hot summers and mild, rainy winters. Earthquakes are common and range in severity. Natural resources include bauxite, lignite, magnesite, oil and marble. Wheat, corn, barley, sugar beets, olives, tomatoes and dairy products comprise the bulk of Greece's agricultural sectors.

THE EARLY CHURCH

The region was inhabited as early as the Paleolithic period and by 3000 b.c. had become home to a sophisticated people. Crete was home to the Minoan empire by 2000 b.c. and gained connections to Egypt and Sicily. The Mycenaeans eventually replaced the Minoans, establishing a system of small city-states, which became the basis for the Roman organization following its incorporation into the Roman Empire.

The name Greece occurs but once in the New Testament (Acts 20.2), and refers to the Roman province Achaia. The exact boundaries of this administrative unit of the Roman Empire varied, but at the beginnings of Christianity it most probably comprised the area of ancient Hellas that extended northward from the southern tip of the Peloponnesus to the borders of Thessaly, Aetolia and Acarnania (Strabo, Geography 17.3.25). Euboea and most of the Cyclades also belonged to this province. Corinth was the capital, where the Roman proconsul had his residence.

The Apostolic Age. The scriptural record concerning the beginnings of Christianity in Greece is limited mainly to the Acts, which discusses Athens and Corinth; Cenchrae, the eastern seaport city of Corinth, is mentioned only briefly in passing. In the course of his second missionary journey, St. Paul stopped for a time in Athens (Acts 17.16–34), where he had "discussions in the synagogue with the Jews and those who worshiped God, and in the market place with those who were there." Some Epicurean and Stoic philosophers debated with him. The scriptural narrative reports the address Paul delivered on the Areopagus and notes: "certain persons became believers; among them Dionysius the Areopagite," the first bishop of Athens, according to Eusebius (Hist. eccl. 4.23.3), "and a woman named Damaris, and others with them." From Athens Paul traveled to Corinth, where he lodged at first with Aquila and Priscilla and preached in the synagogue every Sabbath (Acts 18.1–18). After the arrival of Silas and Timothy from Macedonia Paul spent his time preaching to the Jews until they contradicted him and blasphemed. Thereafter he preached to the Gentiles and resided with Titus Justus. "Crispus the president of the synagogue believed in the Lord and so did his household, and many Corinthians … believed and were baptized." After some time the Jews made a concerted attack against Paul, who was summoned before the tribunal of Gallio, Proconsul of Achaia. The case, however, was dismissed, and after he had spent 18 months in Corinth, Paul departed. He stopped briefly at Cenchrae, where Phoebe "was in the ministry of the church" (Rom 16.1). During his third missionary journey Paul came once more to Greece (Achaia) and remained for three months (Acts 20.2, 3). The Apostle's two letters to the Corinthians close the scriptural account of events in Achaia.

Other sources attempt to complete the narrative about apostolic times. As quoted by Eusebius, dionysius, bishop of Corinth (c. 170), made a surprising statement about Peter and Paul: "both of them taught together in our Corinth and were our founders" (Hist. eccl. 2.25.8). The apocryphal Acta Andreae (c. 260) and the still later Passio, purporting to be a letter of the priests and deacons of Achaia, claim that Andrew preached in that province, suffered martyrdom on November 30 in Patras, and was buried there. In spite of doubts about the historicity of these events, a strong local tradition still links Andrew with Achaia and Patras, as Pope Paul VI's decision in 1964 to return the head of St. Andrew to the reputed place of his martyrdom supports. According to still other traditions, Saints Matthew, Thomas and Luke are reputed to have visited Greece in the course of their missionary journeys.

The Post-apostolic Age. Very little is known about the Church in Greece during the period immediately following the apostolic age. Only the Church of Corinth with its deplorable factions is mentioned in the first Epistle of Clement of Rome. Persecution severely afflicted the Church of Athens during the 2d century. While its Bishop Publius died as a martyr, his successor, Quadratus, worked successfully to revive the faith of the sorely tried Christian community. aristides, the philosopher who wrote an Apology addressed to Emperor Hadrian and athenagoras, who composed the Supplication for the Christians directed to Marcus Aurelius and Commodus, brought glory to the Church of Athens.

Corinth was famous for two of its illustrious bishops. Dionysius rendered special service by his letters to the churches in Athens, Sparta, Nicomedia, Crete, Amastris, Pontus and Rome. He considered the Church at Rome worthy of special praise for its efforts in behalf of the needy and of those Christians who had been condemned to the mines (Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 4.23.10). Bacchylus was an active participant in the easter controversy and wrote a useful letter concerning this question (Jerome, De viris illustribus, 44).

In the first half of the 3d century origen visited Athens, where he completed his commentary on Ezekiel (Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.32.2) and was edified by the exemplary conduct of the Athenian Christians, as he later wrote (Contra Celsum 3.30). The Decian persecution, however, dominated the history of the Church in Achaia at this time. Because of fragmentary evidence, the names of only a few who died for the faith are recorded: Leonides, Bishop of Athens and his companions from Corinth; quadratus (codratus) and his Corinthian companions; Irene and Adrian from a city in Achaia, whose feast day is kept March 10.

Surviving evidence for the progress of the Church in the 4th century is meager for Achaia. From this province two bishops were present at the First Council of nicaea: Pistus of Athens and Strategius of Hephaistia on the island of Lemnos. The presence of Strategius at Nicaea is the earliest extant evidence for the Christianization of the islands in the Aegean Sea.

During the 5th and 6th centuries ecclesiastical jurisdiction in Greece shifted with the political alignment between Rome and Constantinople. The metropolitan of Thessalonika served as vicar of the pope, while Thrace was taken under the control of Constantinople. Emperor Leo III (717–741) made eastern Illyria part of the Byzantine Empire, and Basil I (867–886) directed a missionary enterprise for the full Christianization of the Peloponnesus. With the Eastern Schism in 1054, Greece became part of the Orthodox Church and was gradually subdued by the Ottoman Turks, who gave the hierarchy a limited independence in their elections and internal activities, as well as in their relations with the patriarch of Constantinople.

In 1209, during the occupation of Greece as part of the Crusade against Constantinople, Pope Innocent III created a Latin archiepiscopal see in Athens with 11 suffragan sees. The Cistercians, Dominicans, Franciscans and other orders founded residences in Greece and particularly in Crete. After the Council of florence, Catholic colonies flourished in Crete, Methone, and Coronea with Greek-rite Catholic priests. The invasion of the Ottoman Turks in 1453 sent the Church into decline under an Islamic government.

Bibliography: c. brandis, Paulys Realenzyklopädie der klassischen Altertumswissenschaft, ed. g. wissowa et al., 1.1 (1893) 193–198. a. von harnack, The Mission and Expansion of Christianity in the First Three Centuries, ed. and tr. j. moffat, 2v. (2d ed. New York 1908) v.2. h. leclercq, Dictionnaire d'archéologie chrétienne et de liturgie, eds., f. cabrol, h. leclercq and h. i. marrou, 15 v. (Paris 1907–53) 1.1:321–340. s. vailhÉ, Dictionnaire d'histoire et de géographie ecclésiastiques, ed. a. baudrillart et al. (Paris 1912—) 1:300–304. r. janin, ibid. 5:16–18; 13:876–878. f. dvornik, The Idea of Apostolicity in Byzantium and the Legend of the Apostle Andrew (Cambridge, MA 1958) 181–222. o. volk, Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche ², eds., j. hofer and k. rahner, 10 v. (2d, new ed. Freiburg 1957–65) 6:553–554. j. bayot, Catholicisme, 5:215–216. h. jedin, Handbuch der Kirchengeschichte, 6 v. (Freiburg 1962–) 1:122–123, 241. j. daniÉlou and h. i. marrou, The First Six Hundred Years, tr. v. cronin v.1 of The Christian Centuries (New York 1964–) 1:26, 33,51. e. honigmann, "La Liste originale des Pères de Nicée," Byzantion, 14 (1939) 27–76.

[h. dressler/eds.]

THE MODERN CHURCH

In 1821 a holy war led by the Lavra Monastery of Patras culminated in the defeat of Turkish rule in Greece. A year later the country's first National Assembly proclaimed the Greek Church autocephalous, breaking its dependence on Constantinople. After nine years of revolt aided by France, England and, later, Russia, in February of 1830 the Protocol of London recognized the Peloponnesus, certain Aegean Islands, and the mainland as far as Epirus and Thessaly as an independent country, with Greek Orthodoxy as the state religion. Under the authority of the Bavarian-born King Otto, over 400 monasteries were abolished, their goods distributed among the fighters for freedom. The Megali concept, which involved uniting all Greeks of the declining Ottoman Empire within an independent Greek State, began to come to fruition during the mid-19th century. The Ionic Islands were given to Greece by England in 1863, Thessaly was annexed in 1881 through the Conference of Berlin and in 1897 Crete gained its independence, but reverted to Greece in 1913. During the Balkan War of 1912–13 Greece took possession of South Macedonia, West Thrace and the Aegean Islands; it gained Western Thrace in 1918 and the Dodecanese Islands in 1947.

World War I brought great suffering to both the Greek Church and State. After the war Greece joined the Allied occupation of Turkey. During a 1921 attack on Ankara, Greek forces were defeated by Mustafa Kemal (later Ataturk), and the resulting refugee problem ended the Megali push. From now on Greeks focused on the constant struggle between monarchists and republicans. In 1924 Greece was proclaimed a republic, and during the early 1930s the government attempted to interfere with the Orthodox Church by systematizing the control of parishes and the idiorhythmic or self-ruling monasteries. With the reestablishment of the monarchy under George II (1934), the Orthodox Church came under royal control.

On Oct. 28, 1940 the Italians invaded Greece, forcing the nation into World War II. The Greeks successfully repulsed the Italians, but were not as fortunate against the Germans when Hitler attacked in April of 1941. With Greece under the dictatorial control of General J. Metaxas, German forces remained in the country until October of 1944. During the war, the country's Jewish population, which had numbered 75,000, was decimated, as 60,000 Greek Jews were sent to Auschwitz or executed. Following World War II, several communist resistance groups began a struggle for power that escalated into civil war by 1946. Violence continued, killing thousands, until in August of 1949 a government-led offensive forced the remaining insurgents to flee into Yugoslavia. On Jan. 1, 1952, the monarchy was restored under King Paul I, and from 1952 to 1965 the country experienced relative stability. In 1967 a military dictatorship under Colonel George Papadopoulos took power in Greece, forcing the king into exile and suspending many liberties granted under the constitution. On Dec. 8, 1974, the country returned to civilian rule, drafted a new constitution, held democratic elections, abolished the monarchy and created a parliament. Greece joined the European Union in 1981.

Under the constitution of June 1975, the Greek Orthodox Church was the prevailing religion of the state. As such, it received financial benefits such as state payment of clergy salaries, the funding of church buildings and tax exemptions. The Muslim minority, concentrated in Thrace, which was given legal status by provisions of the Treaty of Lausanne in 1923, was Greece's only officially recognized minority faith. As a faith unrecognized by the state, the Roman Catholic Church in Greece was not allowed to own property except through a created legal entity, although in 1999 the government extended legal recognition to those Catholic churches in existence prior to 1946.

Relations between the Faiths. During the 17th century many Orthodox prelates wrote to the Holy See for assistance, as did the monasteries of Athos, Chios and Patmos. The Jesuits, Capuchins and Lazzarists (Vincentians) founded schools in Athens, Piraeus, Salonika, Crete, Chios, Naxos, Syros and Corfu. Relations with the Orthodox, however, became increasingly difficult because of accusations of attempts at proselytism and Latinization. In 1938 laws were passed to prevent proselytism among the Orthodox by Catholics, and difficulties arose over mixed marriages. Such laws were reinforced by the 1975 constitution, which stipulated that the practice of non-Orthodox worship should not offend or disturb public order.

After World War II many younger monks from Mt. Athos and the monasteries became involved in parochial activities, creating an atmosphere that translated into a move toward Christian reunion. In 1965 Pope Paul VI and Patriarch Athenagoras I began a dialogue that planted the seeds of reconciliation by nullifying the mutual excommunications imposed during the schism of 1054. The government's decision, in 2000, to remove religious affiliation from national identity cards, reflected a growing tolerance for religious diversity among some Greek people, although such tolerance was not reflected by the Orthodox leadership, which opposed the government's move. While Orthodox Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, head of the Orthodox Church, began a discourse with the Vatican, Greek leaders were among those objecting to his efforts at bridging the two divergent faiths. In response to a request by Pope John Paul II to visit Greece in 2001, a metropolitan objected to the proposed visit, noting the efforts of the Catholic Church to aggressively proselytize in Greece. The Eastern Catholic churches, noted Metropolitan Kallinkos, in September of 1999, "are the Trojan Horse of the Catholic Church." The pope's visit, which took place in May, was done as part of a trip retracing the steps of St. Paul. During his historic meeting with Orthodox Archbishop Christodoulos, the pope apologized for the treatment of the Orthodox by Latin Catholics, beginning with the sacking of Constantinople.

Into the 21st Century. By 2000 there were 64 parishes tended by 50 diocesan and 45 religious priests. Other religious included 35 brothers and 127 sisters, although foreign religious, such as members of the Missionaries of Charity, had difficulty obtaining or renewing visas. Most Catholics, who were descendent from Venetian settlers, resided in Athens, Thessaloniki or Patrias, or on the islands of Tinos, Naxos, Syros and Corfu. Polish and Philippine immigrants also comprised part of the Catholic community.

Bibliography: p. joannou, Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche, eds., j. hofer and k. rahner, 10 v. (2d, new ed. Freiburg 1957–65) 4:1231–34. c. konidans, Christian Greece (Athens 1953) 1–22. p. hammond, The Waters of Marah (London 1956). r. janin, Catholicisme, 3:1456–57. j. karayannopulos, Die Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart, 7 v. (3d ed. Tübingen 1957–65) 2:1857–60. Staatslexikon, ed. Görres-Gesellschaft, 8 v. (6th, new and enl. Ed. Freiburg 1957–63) 3:1023–24. Oriente Cattolico (1962) 420.

[f. x. murphy/eds.]