American Orthodox Catholic Church
The American Orthodox Catholic Church (AOCC), or The Holy Eastern Orthodox Catholic and Apostolic Church in North America (THEOCACNA), and sometimes simply the American Orthodox Patriarchate (AOP), was an independent Eastern Orthodox Christian church with origins from 1924–1927. The church was formally created on February 2, 1927 and chartered in the U.S. state of Massachusetts in 1928 with the assistance of Metropolitan Platon Rozhdestvensky of New York; the American Orthodox Catholic Church was initially led by Archbishop Aftimios Ofiesh before his disputed suspension and deposition in 1933.
| American Orthodox Catholic Church | |
|---|---|
Emblem | |
| Abbreviation | AOCC |
| Type | Eastern Christian |
| Classification | Independent Eastern Orthodox |
| Scripture | Septuagint, New Testament |
| Theology | Orthodox theology, Palamism, Hesychasm, Clerical marriage |
| Polity | Episcopal |
| Governance | Holy Synod of the American Orthodox Catholic Church |
| Patriarch | Disputed |
| Region | North America, South America |
| Language | English, Church Slavonic, Spanish, Russian, Irish, German, Arabic, Latin, Italian, Koine Greek, Modern Greek, other vernacular languages |
| Liturgy | Byzantine and Western |
| Founder | Aftimios Ofiesh |
| Origin | 1927 New York, N.Y., United States |
| Branched from | Orthodox Church in America |
| Separations | American World Patriarchs |
The American Orthodox Catholic Church became the first attempted autocephalous Eastern Orthodox Christian jurisdiction for North America, though it was originally intended to function as a diocese of the Russian Orthodox Greek Catholic Church in America (today the Orthodox Church in America). The American Orthodox Catholic Church in its original foundation and continuation functioned as an archbishopric before elevation to the metropolitanate and then patriarchate; in modern iterations, various continuations adopt the patriarchate, most notably one led by Victor Prentice.
The purpose of the American Orthodox Catholic Church was to establish a new tradition in North America separate from any other particular ethnic or cultural traditions. It operated in the United States of America with initial support from the Russian Orthodox Greek Catholic Church in America, until Ofiesh suspected autocephaly and jurisdiction over the Russian Orthodox Greek Catholic Church in America, the Antiochian Archdiocese, Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America, and others.