Michel Sollogoub

This article is the text of a plenary address delivered by Michel Sollogoub, an economist and Orthodox community leader, at a congress of the Orthodox Brotherhood in Western Europe. Taking both a historical and sociological approach, the author surveys the Orthodox presence in Western Europe from the first migratory waves of the twentieth century. He characterizes the Western cultural environment as a society of "post-Christendom" or "accomplished secularity," a specific context that gives Orthodox Christians in Western Europe a distinctive identity and vocation. The article then analyzes the ecclesiological scandal of overlapping jurisdictions, which are contrary to Orthodox canons, and examines the progress of the pre-conciliar process, notably the Chambésy agreements. Finally, it proposes concrete orientations — pastoral, liturgical, catechetical and ecumenical — toward the establishment of a unified local Church on Western European territory.

This article by Michel Sollogoub, economist and vice-president of ACER, constitutes a panoramic reflection delivered at a congress of the Orthodox Brotherhood in Western Europe. Drawing on twenty years of pan-Orthodox experience since the first gathering in Annecy in 1971, the author takes stock of the Orthodox presence in Western Europe in the face of the cultural, political and social changes of the past two decades. The central idea is that the immigration Churches are in the process of biological extinction, while local communities are slowly emerging, called to a renewed witness. The theological contribution lies in the identification of concrete challenges — cultural universalism, community life, missionary language, ecumenical dialogue — and in the valorisation of a vocation as "mediators" between East and West, inherited from the theologians of the Paris school.