Reflection on on U.S. Department of State recognizing the Bulgarian Chaplaincy Associations
Reflection on on U.S. Department of State recognizing the Bulgarian Chaplaincy Associations
BREAKING NEWS [October 8, 2007]
Original source archive: U.S. Department of State:
https://web.archive.org/web/20080709061910/http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2007/90168.htm
For immediate release: Bulgarian Chaplaincy Associations Recognized by U.S. Department of State
U.S. Department of State has released its annual International Religious Freedom Report for 2007. In the section about Bulgaria, the work of Cup & Cross Ministries has been noted through the recognition of the Bulgarian Chaplaincy Association.
Cup & Cross Ministries has worked toward the establishment of the Bulgarian chaplaincy Association since the year 2000. After five years of training chaplains, strategic professional placement and providing ministry in all respective areas of chaplaincy, in 2005 we began the process of registration with the Bulgarian government. This process was both difficult and a long test of our endurance. Although we were not openly denied registration under the 2002 Religious Act, various courts throughout Bulgaria hesitated and delayed our legal registration. Our ministry activities were closely watched and members of our staff were called in for interrogation on various occasions. After resorting to international human rights and religious freedom organizations, finally on February 23, 2007 the Bulgarian Chaplaincy Association received registration by the Sofia Municipality Court to become the first legal chaplaincy organization in Bulgaria officially recognized by the Bulgarian government. The current U.S. Department of State report overviews the above process. The direct quote of the report follows:
International Religious Freedom Report 2007
Released on September 14, 2007
http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2007/90168.htm
Section II. Status of Religious Freedom
Improvements and Positive Developments in Respect for Religious Freedom
Some religious denominations reported that the Religious Confessions Directorate had become more active in assuring that national and local authorities respect and promoted religious freedom and that the national government was more receptive to their concerns. For example, a Protestant group, the Bulgarian Chaplaincy Association, gained legal status on February 23, 2007. The association represents approximately 120 Protestant pastors and individuals mainly affiliated with the Church of God and Assemblies of God but also includes Baptists and Lutherans.
Almost three decades ago, we established the Bulgarian Chaplaincy Association with a vision for ministry in the Bulgarian army, Ministry of Internal Affairs, jail and prison systems, Bulgarian seaports and airports, and the healthcare system. Out of these five goals set before us in 2006 we have fulfilled them all:
1. Tolerant and equal representations of all confessions in the chaplaincy ministry
2. The implementation of a contextualized chaplaincy model
3. The integration of chaplaincy education in all Bulgarian theological higher educational institutions
4. And the educational and consultant work on government and church levels
except:
5. The establishment of legal grounds for regular paid chaplaincy service in the Bulgarian army, Ministry of Internal Affairs, jail and prison systems, Bulgarian seaports and airports, and the healthcare system.
After designing and teaching the Masters of Chaplaincy Ministry program in two major evangelical universities in Bulgaria, we now have some of our trained chaplains working in jails, prisons, healthcare, civil emergency services and the corporate/political level. The legal system in Bulgaria, however, is yet to provide the proper measure for restoring chaplaincy in Bulgaria’s armed forces. To this final step fulfillment we pledge out support in 2016.
Bulgarian Chaplaincy Association: Vision and Resolution
Bulgarian Chaplaincy Association
Resolution No. 1
We,
The founding members of the Bulgarian Chaplaincy Association in its first national assembly today August 19, 2006 in hotel Diana Palace, Yambol
In regard of:
1. Bulgaria’s membership in NATO and its upcoming integration in the European Union
2. The transformations within the Bulgarian Army from mandatory toward standard paid service and the participation of Bulgarian contingent in NATO and UN missions
3. Contract agreement for NATO airbases on Bulgarian territory
4. The strategic renewal of chaplaincy ministry in the Bulgarian army
5. And the present need of chaplaincy ministry integrated in the Bulgarian army, Ministry of Internal Affairs, jail and prison systems, Bulgarian seaports and airports, and the healthcare system,
Declare our support toward:
1. The establishment of legal grounds for regular paid chaplaincy service in the Bulgarian army, Ministry of Internal Affairs, jail and prison systems, Bulgarian seaports and airports, and the healthcare system
2. Tolerant and equal representations of all confessions in the chaplaincy ministry
3. The implementation of a contextualized chaplaincy model
4. The integration of chaplaincy education in all Bulgarian theological higher educational institutions
5. And the educational and consultant work on government and church levels.
We, the founding members of the Bulgarian Chaplaincy Association will work toward the renewal, popularization and equal religious representation of chaplaincy ministry in all professional areas.
August 19, 2006
Diana Palace, Yambol
National Church Survey to Reveal State of the American Church in 2021
National church survey reveals important data about the state of the church in America today
The survey has been conducted for the past several years in several hundred congregations from all denominations across the United States. All collected national trends provide information about essential ministry dynamics and characteristics of the local congregation like:
- Church Type & Membership
- Teams & Leaders
- Praise & Worship
- Pastoral/Personal
- Mission & Vision
Subscribe to ChurchInfluence.com weekly newsletter to receive free each published report containing important information about current church trends in America today.
Sample reports from the national State of the Church survey include:
- 5 common church types across the nation
- 3 financial characteristics of the average church in America
- College education take over church leadership
- 4 leading types of pastor’s teams
- The growth of congregational ethnicity
- 6 dimensions of leadership training for small churches (80-120 members)
- Top 3 problems in church growth
- 8 Successful strategies to communicate with your church volunteer teams
- 4 age groups within the make of church membership
- 7 factors that make your congregational ethnos
- 20th century paradigm for church training still used today
- How can you improve worship within a church service
- 5 ways to improve how the community views your church
- 3 successful ways how to really spend half of your time in prayer and meditation
Though, the majority of participants were among Western North American Pentecostal/Charismatic congregations, the National State of the Church Survey brings results of the state of the church much similar to the ones presented by the Pew Forum, Barna Research Group and Gallup. While the said researchers present a more holistic to the Christian body information, the National State of the Church Survey brings a special focus of statistical data on Pentecostal/Charismatic congregations, their structure, leadership and praxis.
Arizona State Quarter: A Decade Later
We used the time in the San Francisco Bay Area to meet up with old friends from our youth group in Bulgaria. While having coffee at the El Cerrito Starbuck’s early Sunday morning, we reminisced about friends and stories from the past. Leaving the coffee shop, we came across an Arizona state quarter lying on the pavement. After picking it up, my friend shared how his brother just recently moved to Phoenix with his family.
At this time we had no intentions of going to the southern part of Arizona, as we had planned to travel straight across through New Mexico to reach Houston for our Easter service there. Yet, the Lord had other plans and we ended up having a last minute cancellation in our schedule which allowed for us to travel to Phoenix and spend time with our friends there.
This occasion was one of the most blessed of times of fellowship on our trip. We were able to establish divine connections as we prayed for a new Bulgarian Church in the Phoenix area. We were also able to work out the details of being able to broadcast live feed from Bulgarian churches in the US and abroad – a vision which we have held closely to our hearts for the past decade while being involved with the Bulgarian Christian Television and ministry on the internet. Together, we called this broadcast Divine Connections. As a result, Cup & Cross Ministries has been able to broadcast LIVE services from all around Bulgaria in the past month and our team is planning to broadcast live the 2009 annual conference of Bulgarian Evangelical Churches in North America, which will be held May 22-25 in Los Angelis, California.
2020 UPDATE:
- We’ve hosted over one million LIVE broadcast on Bibliata.TV since 2009
- The Bulgarian church in Phoenix has been operational for several years now
- We will be broadcasting the 2020 Bulgarian church conference LIVE via Zoom from Las Vegas, Nevada
Empire State Church
First Things First magazine recently published a religion and public life article on the Russian church. The focus was on orthodoxy and its historic symbioses with the political state. Several remarks from various social observations are in order.
First off, the article seems to have been written by a person who never lived under socialist Soviet Russia and therefore presents a one-sided interpretation of the period. In order words, the information presented is true, but it’s limited to a single political, social and most importantly spiritual view interpretation. The used terminology of “de-Sovietization” is good example for the interpretive limitation. Other post-communist countries properly use the terminology “de-socialization” or even “de-communization,” though no country has ever reached a truly communist state.
Furthermore, the article’s purposefully excludes millions of Russian Catholics, evangelicals and Armenian Christian believers in Russia who were also severely persecuted under the Regime and were not allowed as much freedom of worship as the state Orthodox Church. They cannot be placed outside the perimeter of the revival movements after the Fall of the Berlin Wall, because many of those revivals happened first within their congregations and then influenced the Orthodox Church
The orthodoxy of the described state church is also under question since there’s never been a true Russian orthodox church. Eastern Christianity in Russia is rooted in the Greek Orthodox Church and heavily influenced by the 9th century Bulgarian Christianization of the Slavs prior to reaching Russia. Built after the early byzantine ecclesial model, the Russian church never experienced a true separation of church and state. One of the foundations of Orthodoxy since Constantine the Great has been a co-existential paradigm in the form of symbioses between the Orthodox Church and the political state. Thus, a true Orthodox church has always been an Empire church.
The article further omits historic communist influence of state police (KGB) over the church. During the Regime, KGB agents not only infiltrated Orthodox dioceses, but dictated the course of the church via specifically trained secret agents posing as priests within the church. Many of these agents were placed in key leadership positions as bishops and even the top patriarch of the Russian church. No one could obtain such position or any hierarchy promotion without signing up to cooperate with the state police. Until this influence, which continues in the church today, is exposed and the church is purified from all communist influence through “lustration,” there can never be an independent Russian church – it will always be an Empire church – with a capital “E,” and small “c.”
Religion, State and Society 2011
May 20, 2011 by Cup&Cross
Filed under Featured, News, Publication
Religion, State and Society 2011
Catholic Chaplains to the British Forces in the First World War
Military Chaplains and the Religion of War in Ottonian Germany, 919- 1024
World Religions and Norms of War
Finding Friends in Phoenix or the Story of an Arizona State Quarter
We used the time in the San Francisco Bay Area to meet up with old friends from our youth group in Bulgaria. While having coffee at the El Cerrito Starbuck’s early Sunday morning, we reminisced quite a bit remembering friends and stories from the past. Leaving the coffee shop, we came across an Arizona state quarter lying on the pavement. After picking it up, my friend shared how his brother just recently moved to Phoenix with his family.
Bulgarian Chaplaincy Associations Recognized by U.S. Department of State
BREAKING NEWS [October 8, 2007]
Original source: U.S. Department of State www.state.gov
For immediate release
Bulgarian Chaplaincy Associations Recognized by U.S. Department of State
U.S. Department of State has released its annual International Religious Freedom Report for 2007. In the section about Bulgaria, the work of Cup & Cross Ministries has been noted through the recognition of the Bulgarian Chaplaincy Association.
Cup & Cross Ministries has worked toward the establishment of the Bulgarian chaplaincy Association since the year 2000. After five years of training chaplains, strategic professional placement and providing ministry in all respective areas of chaplaincy, in 2005 we began the process of registration with the Bulgarian government. This process was both difficult and a long test of our endurance. Although we were not openly denied registration under the 2002 Religious Act, various courts throughout Bulgaria hesitated and delayed our legal registration. Our ministry activities were closely watched and members of our staff were called in for interrogation on various occasions. After resorting to international human rights and religious freedom organizations, finally on February 23, 2007 the Bulgarian Chaplaincy Association received registration by the Sofia Municipality Court to become the first legal chaplaincy organization in Bulgaria officially recognized by the Bulgarian government. The current U.S. Department of State report overviews the above process. The direct quote of the report follows:
International Religious Freedom Report 2007
Released on September 14, 2007
http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2007/90168.htm
Section II. Status of Religious Freedom
Improvements and Positive Developments in Respect for Religious Freedom
Some religious denominations reported that the Religious Confessions Directorate had become more active in assuring that national and local authorities respect and promoted religious freedom and that the national government was more receptive to their concerns. For example, a Protestant group, the Bulgarian Chaplaincy Association, gained legal status on February 23, 2007. The association represents approximately 120 Protestant pastors and individuals mainly affiliated with the Church of God and Assemblies of God but also includes Baptists and Lutherans.
