Archeparchy of Sidon (Melkite Greek)
Archieparchia Sidoniensis Graecorum Melkitarum
| |
|---|---|
| Location | |
| Country | Lebanon |
| Statistics | |
| Population - Catholics | (as of 2010) 32,000 |
| Parishes | 53 |
| Information | |
| Denomination | Melkite Greek Catholic Church |
| Rite | Byzantine Rite |
| Established | 1964 |
| Cathedral | Saint Nicholas Cathedral |
| Current leadership | |
| Pope | Francis |
| Patriarch | Youssef Absi |
| Archeparch | Elie Bechara Haddad |
Melkite Greek Catholic Archeparchy of Sidon (Latin: Archeparchia Sidoniensis Graecorum Melkitarum) is a diocese of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church suffragan of the Melkite Greek Catholic Archeparchy of Tyre. It is governed by Archeparch Elie Bechara Haddad. The territory is made up of 53 parishes and, as of 2010, 32,000 Melkite Catholics.
The archeparchy's jurisdiction covers the Melkite Greek population of Sidon District and Chouf District in Lebanon. Its archeparchial seat is the city of Sidon, at the cathedral of Saint Nicholas.
Sidon was the site of an ancient Christian community, dating to its earliest days. The Christian origins of Sidon date to the New Testament, in the Gospel of Matthew (Matthew 15: 21–28)—"From there, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon"—and the Gospel of Mark (Mark 7, 31)—"Jesus left the region of Tyre, and came through Sidon to the Sea of Galilee midst of the coasts of Decapolis." On the arrest and imprisonment of Paul, in the Acts of the Apostles (Acts 27.3), "The next day we touched at Sidon, and Julius treated Paul the benevolent, allowed him to go to his friends and to seek care." However, the presence of a bishop is historically first attested at the First Council of Nicaea of 325.
The community was first documented in 770.
With the conquest of the last Crusader bastion in Acre by the Mamelukes in 1291, the Christian community in Sidon largely vanished. The reconstruction of the Christian communities in and around Sidon began again in 1604 with the election of Ignatius Houtiyeh as bishop of Tyre and Sidon.
Thereafter some Melkite Orthodox priests converted to the Roman Catholic Church. They united ecclesiastically with the Roman Church under the administration of Euthymius II Karmah, Melkite Patriarch of Antioch.
The Eparchy of Sidon started in 1683 with its Melkite bishops in communion with Rome.
Initially it was united with the archeparchy of Tyre; the two locations were separated in the mid-eighteenth century (approximately 1752). Tyre became an archeparchy and Sidon an eparchy.
On 18 November 1964 the eparchy was elevated to the rank of archeparchy by Pope Paul VI.
On 27 January 2007, the pope gave his assent to Elie Haddad's election, canonically made by the Synod of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church on 11 October 2006, to Archbishop of Sidon to the Melkites.[1]
33°34′00″N 35°22′00″E / 33.5667°N 35.3667°E / 33.5667; 35.3667
