Eastern Orthodoxy

Eastern Orthodoxy is a socially conservative, ancient church with elaborate rituals and a strict hierarchy.

Bartholomew I is regarded as the “first among equals” among patriarchs in Eastern Orthodoxy and the spiritual leader of the world’s Orthodox Christians.

But the Russian Orthodox Church, the largest communion in Eastern Orthodoxy, has stayed on the old calendar, observing Christmas on Jan. 7 on the new calendar, as have Serbian, Georgian and some other Orthodox.

In 2019, the Patriarchate of Constantinople — the senior authority in Eastern Orthodoxy — granted the independent church, the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, legitimacy, a move that outraged Russian leaders.

Ukraine’s separate and independent branch of Eastern Orthodoxy was revived after the country gained independence with the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991.