Autoqefalia e Kishës Ortodokse Shqiptare (1920-1924)
The Autocephaly of the Albanian Orthodox Church (1920-1924)

Summary/Abstract: The Orthodox Church has played an important role in the Balkans during the history of the Byzantine Empire as well as during the Ottoman one.It has ganined many righzs in relation to the spiritual administration, but even legal of the life of the Christians. As the other peoples of the Balkans the Albanians, too, had to wage war against the Greek chauvinist propaganda which used it and speculated to the utmost with their religious belonging. They understood that the question of the Albanian Orthodox Church was not only religious, but even political. That’s why, very early, in the framework of the National Renaissance began the efforts for the creation of the Albanian Independent Orthodox Church, efforts which later crowned this church as National Church. The question of the Orthodox church in Albania had two aspects: 1 – The inner aspect, i.e. the emancipation of the Orthodox church inside the country, the war against the hellenization of the Orthodox population and the growth of the religious conscience by the religious preachments. Without doubt, it was a difficult task, because for a period of 500 hundred years the Albanian orthodoxes were called Greeks; 2 – The outer aspect, it was necessary to assure the recognition of the Albanian Church by the Patriarchane of Istanbul, a thing seeming almost impossible. The Albanians sought to repeat the case of Bulgaria which gained at the beginning the independence of the Orthodox church, and, afterwards the state independence. But, differently from Bulgaria, which found support in Russia, for Albania didn’t came out no-one supporting voice. In this situation, the Albanian choosed the second way, followed even by Serbia and Greece, i.e. to achieve the state independence and, afterwards, to achieve the independence of the Albanian orthodox church. The Albanian worked with even more force to present the request for the Independence of the Albanian Orthodox Church to be put forward as a request of all the Orthodox people. Nevertheless, as decisive factor for the success of the independence of the Church in Albania we must place the strengthening of the Albanian state. For this reason the church movement would reach its success in Albania in the years 1920-1924, which first of all were years of the political reconstruction of the country. These years were years of important achievements for Albania. [...]

• Details
• Contents