Antiochian Catholic Church in America

The Antiochian Catholic Church in America or the ACCA, is one of the Independent Catholic Churches. The ACCA is distinct from most such Churches in that it largely embraces the theology and much of the practice of the Syriac Orthodox Church and that of its daughter Church, the Indian Orthodox Church, from which the ACCA primarily derives its apostolic succession via the lineage of Joseph Rene Vilatte. The clergy of the ACCA also derive their Holy Orders from the Old Catholic movement, in this case through Arnold Harris Mathew. However, the ACCA is not in full communion with the Oriental Orthodox Churches because it ordains women and because it does not require celibacy of its bishops, allowing them, like priests and deacons, to marry.^[1] The ACCA states that its approach to theology and practice is a process of "critical reappropriation" which is open to influences from all sectors of Christendom but is, at the same time, firmly grounded in the Syriac Christian tradition, particularly with regard to such basic matters as Christology, soteriology, ecclesiology, and ethics.

The current See City of the ACCA is Knoxville, Tennessee. It is led by a Metran, or Archbishop, Victor Mar Michael Herron (consecrated 1990, Metran since 1996), who is the pastor of St. Demetrios Antiochian Catholic Church. While attendance at the Sunday Qurbana (Eucharist) at St. Demetrios is small, averaging around 15 people (including three clergymembers), the congregation operates a food bank and meal program which serves around 200 meals per week. Another small congregation, St. Elias, worships in nearby Kodak, Tennessee. On October 5, 2008, the Pastor of St. Elias, Andreas Richard Turner, was made a bishop, taking the name Mar Cassian. As a suffragan bishop, he will assist Mar Michael in his episcopal duties and will continue as chancellor.

In 2007, the Cloistered Heart Franciscans, a non-residential, ecumenical sisterhood of women (who do not necessarily vow celibacy, but fidelity in marriage), headed by Mother Shirley Raper of Sparta, Tennessee, reorganized within the ACCA as the Cloistered Heart Myrrh-bearers. Mother Shirley, a deaconess, conducts weekly services for about 20 people at a small facility, called Holy Adoration Chapel, in the absence of a priest. Sister Jacqueline Dierring, of Black Mountain, North Carolina, also a deaconess, conducts similar services at Holy Trinity chapel, an oratory in her home.

Fr. Gregory Ned Blevins, the ACCA's Ecumenical and Social Concerns Representative, offers the Qurbana weekly at the Chapel of SS Perpetua and Felicity in his home near Columbia, South Carolina. Amma Caitlin Turner is an itinerant missionary throughout the southeastern United States.

External links

• Unofficial ACCA website Owned and maintained by Fr. Gregory Ned Blevins, the Ecumenical and Social Concerns Representative of the ACCA.
• Antiochian Catholic Publications Contains most of the ACCA liturgy, a variant of the West Syrian Rite. Owned and maintained by Andreas Mar Cassian Richard Turner, ACCA Chancellor and Suffragan Bishop.
• Newspaper article concerning St. Demetrios

Reference

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