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Biography of His Eminence, Archbishop MARK

The Most Reverend +MARK
The Most Reverend +MARK
The Most Reverend +MARK

Born on Saturday, June 22, 1958, in New Albany, Indiana, His Eminence Archbishop Mark was baptized at Our Lady of Perpetual Help Roman Catholic Church in 1958 and was confirmed at the age of nine. He attended elementary school at Our Lady of Perpetual Help and graduated from New Albany High School in 1976. He completed his Bachelor of Arts degree at Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 1985. In 1987, he was awarded a Master of Arts degree in Biblical Literature from Oral Roberts University and accepted a position as Adjunct Professor of Old Testament.

Introduced to the Orthodox Church by the V. Rev. George Eber, pastor of St. Antony in Tulsa, Oklahoma, as well as his Church History professors, Dr. Jerry Sandidge and Dr. Howard Ervin, Archbishop Mark was received into the Church through Holy Chrismation on Great and Holy Wednesday in 1989. He attended St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary, where he received his Master of Divinity degree in 1991.

From 1993 to 1997, His Eminence worked in mental health, initially as a mental health worker at Mercy Psychiatric Hospital on a dual diagnosis unit. From 1997 to 2000, he worked as a crisis worker in the emergency room at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center in Aliquippa, PA.

Archbishop Mark was ordained a deacon on Sunday, August 17, 1997, and to the Holy Priesthood on Sunday, September 7, 1997. He served as priest of St. John the Evangelist Church in Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania, from 1997 to 2000. In January 2001, he was assigned to St. George Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

His Eminence was consecrated to the Episcopacy on Sunday, December 5, 2004. His consecrating bishops included His Beatitude Ignatius IV at the Patriarchal Cathedral in Damascus, Syria, along with numerous Metropolitans of the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Antioch. Archbishop Mark was enthroned at St. George Cathedral in Toledo, Ohio, on Friday, August 25, 2005, and served as Bishop of the Diocese of Toledo and the Midwest of the Antiochian Orthodox Christian Archdiocese of America.

He was received into the Orthodox Church in America on Saturday, January 1, 2011, and given the title of Bishop of Baltimore. On Friday, January 17, 2014, he was nominated to fill the vacant Episcopal See of the Diocese of Philadelphia and Eastern Pennsylvania during a special Diocesan Assembly at Saint Nicholas Church in Bethlehem, PA, having served as the Diocese's Administrator since 2012. On Monday, March 18, 2014, he was elected by the Holy Synod of Bishops of the Orthodox Church in America to fill the vacant Episcopal See of Philadelphia and Eastern Pennsylvania.

His Eminence was enthroned as Bishop of Philadelphia and Eastern Pennsylvania during the Hierarchical Divine Liturgy at Saint Stephen Cathedral on Saturday, May 10, 2014. He was elevated to the rank of Archbishop during the 2015 Spring Session of the Holy Synod and has presided as Archbishop of Philadelphia and Eastern Pennsylvania for the past 10 years.


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