§ 26. General Survey

The sources reviewed so far are of general significance for the whole Church, and by them every particular (local) church that wishes to remain within the unity of ecumenical Orthodoxy is bound to be governed. Besides these general sources, there exist further special sources for the individual particular churches. These sources are conditioned by the church’s position within the several states, and concern the relation of the Church to the State and the external ecclesiastical administration. The laws which determine the relation of the Church to the State and regulate the external ecclesiastical administration carry, in the states concerned, binding force both for the Church and for the State, since they were issued either jointly by the ecclesiastical and the civil authority, or issued by one of these authorities and received and confirmed by the other.

According to the catalogue of the Patriarchate of Constantinople, issued in April of the year 1855, the following particular churches existed with their own independent administration, or autocephalous churches (ἐκκλησίαι αὐτοκέφαλοι): 1. Constantinople, 2. Alexandria, 3. Antioch, 4. Jerusalem, 5. Cyprus, 6. Russia, 7. Karlovci, 8. Sinai, 9. Montenegro, and 10. the Church in the Kingdom of Greece.[1] To these are to be added, from more recent times: 11. Hermannstadt (Sibiu), 12. Bulgaria, 13. Chernivtsi-Dalmatia (Bukovina and Dalmatia), 14. the Church in the Kingdom of Serbia, and 15. the Church in the Kingdom of Romania.[2] Of these self-governing, or autocephalous, churches, only the following possess their own special statutory prescriptions, formally confirmed by the competent authorities: 1. Constantinople, 2. Russia, 3. Karlovci, 4. the Church in the Kingdom of Greece, 5. Hermannstadt (Sibiu), 6. Bulgaria, 7. Bukovina-Dalmatia, 8. the Church in the Kingdom of Serbia, and 9. the Church in the Kingdom of Romania; the rest have none, but are governed generally by the laws contained in the general sources of law.[3]