HOME ► Introduction

Welcome to the Home Page of the Orthodox Church of Manchester’s historic Greek Community. We are under the spiritual jurisdiction of the Archdiocese of Thyateira and Great Britain of the Ecumenical Patriarchate.

Our community is a place of communion and unity, worship and service. It is a spiritual reality, a microcosm of the entire Church, the Body of Christ.

I hope that our church’s Home Pages will help develop dialogue not only among Orthodox believers, but also with all people of good will. It is our intention to address some at least of the deepest questions and problems relevance to a modern world thirsty for life’s values, and at the same time to offer information about our local church.

Faith in God is of immense importance. The whole of human history bears witness to this. Without faith in God we are in danger of slipping into a chaotic, terrifying and sterile isolation. We should encounter all life’s trials and temptations with a firm faith in God, with patience, steadfastness and humility, with unceasing prayer and unbounded love for all.

The authenticity of the Orthodox Church’s expounding of the teaching of the Gospel, the Church’s co-operation with the spiritual good-works of the faithful, the richness and magnificence and the mystical experience of the Church’s worship capture the interest of many, since it is in Christ alone that the human being lives and progresses unimpeded.

The believer’s progress begins in the church with baptism in the name and into the life of the Holy Trinity.

In the life of the Church, we become aware of our existence, we contemplate our life and our place in the world, we find our personal fulfilment and can face successfully the problems of our era.

The Divine Liturgy and the Church’s sacramental Mysteries are there for the faithful: without the sacramental life of the Church there is no salvation. The Divine Liturgy and the sacramental life are the very essence of the Church.

Through the Divine Liturgy, Christ, his teaching, his Cross, and his Resurrection are extended through the ages. In this mystery, the Lord offers Himself to us, and we, through this mystery have communion with him and are truly united with him.

Thus it is that our hungering age is nourished and healed with spiritual food. The Body of Christ sustains us, nourishes our souls and lives, and satisfies our human nature’s hunger, with the sense of God’s presence within us and among us.

Baptised into the grace of the New Creation, we hasten to the total transfiguration of body and soul, person and community.

In the Divine Liturgy we truly find the Lord as God and man, and the faithful in Him.

It is our fond hope that the inauguration of our church’s Home Page will be a significant event, offering the powerful witness of Orthodoxy to the faithful of every age and calling, and to all who find an interest in it, informing them of the life and activity of our local Orthodox Church and community.

XArchimandrite Nikolaos.