The Self-Ruled Antiochian Archdiocese of North America
Excerpted from http://www.antiochian.org/about.
The Christian Church is based in the life and teachings of Jesus Christ, the eternal Son of God, who has come in to the world as a man for our salvation. This is the foundational belief of every true Christian. “Orthodox” means right teaching or right worship, and we understand our Orthodox Christian faith to be the full and right revelation of God’s desire for us to believe in Him, know Him, abide in Him and receive eternal life from Him. The clearest and most concise explanation of our faith can be found in the ancient Nicene Creed. Our Church traces its roots in unbroken apostolic succession to first century Antioch, the city in which the disciples of Jesus Christ were first called “Christians” (Acts 11:26).
The Church of Antioch was established by the Apostles Paul and Barnabas in 42 A.D., with St. Peter serving for the next eight years as its first prelate. The Church of Antioch is one of the five ancient Patriarchates of the Christian Church, along with Alexandria, Constantinople, Jerusalem, and Rome. Many of the great saints of the Church, including St. Ignatius and St. John Chrysostom, have come from Antioch. The Patriarchate has endured despite centuries of oppression, and today shepherds over half a million Christians in Syria, Lebanon and other countries in the Middle East along with communities throughout the Americas, Australia and Europe. The Church is led by His Beatitude Ignatius IV, Patriarch of Antioch and the all East.
The Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of North America includes over 200 churches and missions throughout the United States and Canada. We are in full communion with our brothers and sisters in various other Orthodox Christian jurisdictions, such as the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America and the Orthodox Church in America, and are all affiliated through SCOBA (the Standing Conference of Canonical Orthodox Bishops of the Americas.) Together we work to nurture the Orthodox Christians of this land--whether immigrants or native-born, cradle Orthodox, or converts--and to bring America to the ancient Orthodox Christian Faith.
