This is the second collection of essays, compiled from opinion columns written during the period 2012-2020, when George Matsoukas served as executive director of Orthodox Christian Laity (OCL). The first collection, "A Church in Captivity: The Greek Orthodox Church of America," is also a collection of opinion columns, this one written during the period 1990-2007. This series of observational essays can be considered a first cut in putting together the history of Orthodoxy in America during this 30-year period. These essays also tell the OCL story and provide an insight into how the organization functions. The essays are written from the point of view of how societal events and concerned faithful were energized to advance the mission of Orthodox Christian Laity. OCL is a pan-Orthodox educational and advocacy ministry formed in 1987 to: + advocate for the restoration and strengthening of the historic role of the laity in the conciliar governance of the Orthodox Church in the United States. + support the spiritual renewal and regeneration of the Orthodox Christian Church in the United States in its Apostolic Mission. + advocate for and promote transparency and accountability in the governance of the Orthodox Church in the United States. + advocate for and champion the establishment of an administratively and canonically-unified, self-governing autocephalous Orthodox Christian Church in the United States. Matsoukas’ musings in his first volume, "A Church in Captivity," reflect the deep political changes transpiring after the "fall" of Communism in the captive "Orthodox" nations, and then in what manner those "national" churches began to respond to their "diasporas," those still existing multiple jurisdictions in The United States. This weighing of the ongoing strain between those who continue to uphold that "a unity through a simple Eucharistic oneness is sufficient" and those who insist on a "canonically unified Church administration" is the stuff of volume two, "Under One Roof: Uniting the Orthodox Church of America." It is the fruit of the author’s essays of the past 13 years. Matsoukas’ objective is to call us to be faithful to the Canonical Tradition of the Church so that it can bring forth the fullest witness of Orthodoxy through uniting all Orthodox in The United States. Considering the low percentage of Orthodox believers vis-à-vis others in this nation, the call to strength in unity makes practical sense as well. There is strength in numbers. Matsoukas reminds us that although we seem to be under one Eucharistic roof, he calls for a oneness which must not be as a loose federation of jurisdictions dependent on Synods abroad, but an authentic unity in itself total, canonical, autocephalous, as other local churches each became. The reader is grateful for the wide coverage given us of thirteen years of new Orthodox witness in the six divisions (Orthodox Christian Laity Story, Promoting Unity, Holy and Great Council, Assembly of Bishops, Greek Orthodox Archdiocese, Renewal) of this new volume. The reader can take each article, one by one, and enjoy the author’s convincing presentations, and then sit back and enjoy arguing with him! Can an assembly of jurisdictions occasionally gathered at an altar, receiving from one cup and one diskos, be the fullness of Orthodox witness under one roof? The author’s answer is an emphatic, "No!"

In this sweeping history, Alexander Kitroeff shows how the Greek Orthodox Church in America has functioned as much more than a religious institution, becoming the focal point in the lives of the country's million-plus Greek immigrants and their descendants. Assuming the responsibility of running Greek-language schools and encouraging local parishes to engage in cultural and social activities, the church became the most important Greek American institution and shaped the identity of Greeks in the United States. Kitroeff digs into these traditional activities, highlighting the American church's dependency on the "mother church," the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Constantinople, and the use of Greek language in the Sunday liturgy. Today, as this rich biography of the church shows us, Greek Orthodoxy remains in between the Old World and the New, both Greek and American.

A resource ideal for students as well as general readers, this two-volume encyclopedia examines the diversity of the Asian American and Pacific Islander spiritual experience. Despite constituting a fairly small proportion of the U.S. population—roughly 5 percent—Asian Americans are a widely diverse group with equally heterogeneous religious beliefs and traditions. This encyclopedia provides a single source for authoritative information on the Asian American and Pacific Islander religious experience, addressing South Asian Americans, such as Indian Americans and Pakistani Americans; East Asian Americans, including Chinese Americans, Japanese Americans, and Korean Americans; and Southeast Asian Americans, whose ethnicities include Filipino Americans, Thai Americans, and Vietnamese Americans. Pacific Islanders include Hawaiians, Samoans, Marshallese, Tongan, and Chamorro. The coverage includes not only traditional eastern belief systems and traditions such as Buddhism, Confucianism, and Hinduism as well as Micronesian and Polynesian religious traditions in the United States, but also the culture and religious rituals of Asian American Christians.

"And He said to them, 'Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.'"-Mark 16:15 In the middle of the first century, God sent St. Mark the Evangelist to proclaim the Good News and teach the Egyptians about the true God. He became the first pope and patriarch of the See of St. Mark and the founder of the Coptic Orthodox Church. For centuries, the Coptic Church remained mostly within the boundaries of Egypt, and the majority of Copts, including the clergy, were against the idea of immigration. But there were exceptions: Pope Cyril VI, the late Bishop Samuel, and the blessed Fr. Mikhail Ibrahim supported and encouraged immigration. And in the middle of the twentieth century, the Coptic diaspora slowly began. Within the last five decades, St. Mark continued to carry the Good News through his disciples to the United States and around the world. The History of the Coptic Orthodox Church in the United States tells the story of the earliest immigrants who left their beloved homeland to start a new life and establish the roots of the Coptic Orthodox Church in America. In rich detail, it pays lasting tribute to a remarkable cast of individuals, families, and servants, including: -The first pioneers who welcomed each new immigrant as they arrived on America's shore -The early priests who traveled tirelessly throughout the United States and Canada to minister to individuals and families in rented spaces and the domestic church -The great popes-HH Cyril VI, HH Shenouda III, and HH Tawadros II-who provided loving guidance from Alexandria Through the efforts of all these servants, St. George Coptic Orthodox Church in Philadelphia was established as one of the first Coptic churches in the United States, along with others in New York, New Jersey, and beyond. The History of the Coptic Orthodox Church in the United States recounts the celebrations, struggles, and growth of these congregations as they maintain the traditions and spirit of the Coptic Orthodox Church into the twenty-first century.

It has been widely recognized that Christianity is the fastest growing religion in one of the last communist-run countries of the world: the People's Republic of China. Yet it would be a mistake to describe Chinese Christianity as merely a clandestine faith or, as hoped by the Communist Party of China, a privatized religion. Alexander Chow argues that Christians in mainland China have been constructing a more intentional public theology to engage the Chinese state and society, since the end of the Cultural Revolution (1966-76). Chinese Public Theology recalls the events which have led to this transformation and examines the developments of Christianity across three generations of Chinese intellectuals from the state-sanctioned Protestant church, the secular academy, and the growing urban renaissance in Calvinism. Moreover, Chow shows how each of these generations have provided different theological responses to the same sociopolitical moments of the last three decades. This study illustrates how a growing understanding of Chinese public theology has been developed through a subconscious intermingling of Christian and Confucian understandings of public intellectualism. These factors result in a contextually-unique understanding of public theology, but also one which is faced by contextual limitations as well. With this in mind, Chow draws from the Eastern Orthodox doctrine of theosis and the Chinese traditional teaching of the unity of Heaven and humanity (Tian ren heyi) to offer a way forward in the construction of a Chinese public theology.