[darkangel82]

Interesting article. Not sure why the Huff Post would run it though.

[The_Reader_David]

Part of the growth of Met. +ATHENAGOROS’s flock in Central America has been a result of mass conversions among the Mayans of Guatemala and southern Mexico (which interestingly happened independently of the earlier conversion of a convent of nuns in Guatemala City who run the main orphanage in Guatemala).

Actually orphanages seem to be playing a role in the spread of Orthodoxy in Latin America — besides the Hogar Rafael Ayau in Guatemala City (under Antioch, not Constantinople) there is the St. Innocent Orphanage (I think OCA) near Rosarita, Mexico, basically rescues boys who would otherwise be left to grow up on the streets (or worse).

[Alex Murphy]

Of its 550,000 members, only 5,000 are Greek, according to Maxwell Dotson, executive director of One World One Community, a non-profit co-founded by Metropolitan Athenagoras. The vast majority are natives of that region who are seeking a spiritual identity within the transplanted Greek church. The Greek Orthodox Church in the archdiocese now has only three clergy members of Greek descent, of the 52 who are serving.

IOW, only 1% of its membership and 5% of it's clergy are ethnically Greek. Maybe it's just me, but I'm not seeing a problem here, unless it's considered a fundamental part of the mission of the GOC to spread Greek culture in addition to the Gospel.