Let’s Talk Live with Dr. Elizabeth H. Prodromou, Mustafa Akyol, and Fr. Christopher Metropulos
We are pleased to announce our myOCN Community Online Gathering this coming Thursday, July 9th, at 7:00 pm EST with special guests Dr. Elizabeth H. Prodromou and Mustafa Akyol. Fr. Christopher Metropulos, our Executive Director, will be offering a “Let’s Talk” 1 hour interactive video session on Zoom with limited availability for two-way discussion. There may be a change in the status of the edifice from a museum into a mosque and we thought it prudent to bring this issue to your attention and to get some facts about what is actually transpiring. We will also be live-streamed on our Facebook page. Join us and thousands online for prayers and discussion. Families are welcome, and you will have the opportunity to ask questions. If you would like to attend, please register HERE to receive sign-in instructions.
Dr. Elizabeth H. Prodromou
Dr. Elizabeth H. Prodromou is a faculty member at The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, where she directs the Initiative on Religion, Law, and Diplomacy. She is non-resident Senior Fellow and Co-Chair of the Working Group on Christians and Religious Pluralism in the Middle East, at the Center for Religious Freedom at the Hudson Institute, and was non-resident Senior Fellow in National Security and the Middle East, at the Center for American Progress. She is a Co-President of Religions for Peace International. Prodromou served as Vice Chair and Commissioner on the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (2004-2012) and was a member of the U.S. Secretary of State’s Religion & Foreign Policy Working Group (2011-2015). Her research interests focus on geopolitics and religion, with particular focus on the Middle East and Southeastern Europe. The author of multiple edited volumes and many publications in scholarly and policy journals, Prodromou is a frequent commentator and contributor in US and international media. She holds a Ph.D. in political science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
https://www.religiousfreedominstitute.org/cornerstone/turkeys-cultural-heritage-cudgel
Mustafa Akyol

Mustafa Akyol is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute’s Center for Global Liberty and Prosperity, where he focuses on the intersection of public policy, Islam, and modernity. A Turkish journalist and author, he worked for more than a decade as an opinion columnist for Hurriyet Daily News, and the Middle‐East focused Al-Monitor.com. Since 2013, he also has a been a contributing opinion writer for the New York Times.
Erdogan Should Not Erase Turkey’s Christian Past
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Shaped by a life of service to Christ’s Church, Fr. Christopher has dedicated
himself to using all the tools God has placed at his disposal to spread the light of
Orthodoxy across the United States of America and around the world. Speaker,
Radio Host, Professor, Founding Father of the Orthodox Christian Network
(OCN), Pastor, Leader of 12 Pilgrimages to the Holy Land and the Ecumenical
Patriarchate, Author, Father, Grandfather and Defender of the Faith.
As founder, host, and executive director of the Orthodox Christian Network he
shepherds a dynamic and rapidly expanding ministry bringing joy, hope, and
salvation in Jesus Christ to close to 1 million people a month in more than 190
countries. A nationally known radio personality, Fr. Christopher co-hosted the
groundbreaking, internationally televised Epiphany Celebration of Tarpon
Springs, Florida in January 2006, presided over by Ecumenical Patriarch
Bartholomew and seen on the Hallmark Channel. He was also featured in a
2012 television broadcast on TLC entitled “4 Weddings.” In May 2014, he
offered live English commentary from Rome via Radio Vaticana and EWTN for
the worldwide televised broadcast of the historic meeting of Pope Francis and
Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew in Jerusalem. In November 2014, he
returned to Rome to provide the English commentary on a second Radio
Vaticana/EWTN worldwide televised broadcast, this time on the occasion of
Pope Francis’ visit to the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Istanbul in celebration of
the Feast Day of St Andrew. He worked alongside a team of professionals from
the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America on these broadcasts. Currently
serves as Vice President, International Association of Digital Media Orthodox
Pastoral Care.
Fr. Christopher holds a Bachelor of Arts Degree from Hellenic College of
Brookline, Massachusetts, a Master of Divinity Studies Degree from
Brookline’s Holy Cross School of Theology, and a Doctor of Ministry Degree
from the Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. His dedication to the family unit
drove Fr. Christopher to be certified as a Family Mediator by the Chief Justice
of the Supreme Court of the State of Florida. Fr. Christopher has also studied
extensively at the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University. He has served
the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese for more than 40 years. He has held many
different assignments as: Representative to the United Nations and United
States Missions; Assistant Priest St. Demetrios Cathedral, Astoria, NY; Dean of
the Assumption Cathedral in Denver, CO; Pastor of the Archangel Michael
Church, Roslyn, NY; Pastor of the St. Demetrios Greek Orthodox Church in Ft
Lauderdale Florida, President of Hellenic College Holy Cross School of
Theology, Dean of Admissions and Registrar of the Hellenic College and Holy
Cross School of Theology; member of the Archdiocesan Council; President of
the Archdiocesan Presbyter’s Council for two consecutive terms; and council
member of the Metropolis of Denver and the Metropolis of Atlanta. He also
served as Vicar of the South Florida Conference from 1998-2011. In the
summer of 2008, he was elevated by His Eminence Metropolitan Alexios to the
rank of Protopresbyter of the Ecumenical Patriarchate with the blessings of the
Holy and Sacred Synod, the highest honor bestowed on a married clergyman.
Fr. Christopher and his late wife, Presbytera Georgia Mitsos, have six children
and four grandchildren.
With the blessings of His Eminence Archbishop Elpidophoros and Metropolitan
Gerasimos of San Francisco he was appointed as Interim Pastor of St. Nicholas
Greek Orthodox Church in San Jose, Ca in October 2021.
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