10,717. That’s how many clergy and church leaders Greek Church, the Church of Crete and the Holy Metropolises of the Dodecanese. Of these, 9,543 – nine out of ten – are priests. A recent complete record of organic offices in the Greco-Cretan Archdiocese and 94 metropolitans of the country, for the first time, gives the Greek government the opportunity to know how many organic offices each Church has. “So far, the situation has been unclear,” a government official told K.. In particular, as indicated in the presidential decree published in the Government Gazette, there are a total of 9,371 organic positions in the Greek Church: 81 metropolitan, 17 assistant bishops, 8,311 priests, 292 preachers, 320 deacons and 349 church employees. To this must be added the office of Archbishop of Athens and all Greece.

At the same time, to the number of 9,371 positions, it is necessary to add 1,057 positions of the Church of Crete (of which 955 are vicars), in respect of which a separate presidential decree was issued, as well as 289 positions of the Metropolitans of Dodecanese (277 priests and 12 church employees) recently established by law.

As for the number of priests in the Greek Church, the Holy Archdiocese of Athens has the most (528). They are followed by the Metropolitans of Patras (236), Ilia (208), Demetrius and Almiros (191) and Phthiotis (181). On the other hand, the metropolises with the least number of priests are Kythera and Antikythera (22), Fira, Amorgos and Nision (36), Drinupoleos, Pogoniani and Konicis (40), Kaisariani, Byron and Hymett (45) and Kefalonia (46). .

The number of priests is obviously related to the size of the metropolis, but not necessarily related to the influence of the metropolitan (this is also determined by the personality of the metropolitan).

Since 1945

The definition of organic positions was made after 77 years on the basis of last year’s agreement between the government and the Church. In particular, since 1945, 6,000 priestly positions have been appointed, but the necessary royal (then) decree was not issued, with the result that regular positions did not exist. In 2022, the remaining positions of priests were established (2311 for the Greek Church). During a recent meeting of the protopriest representatives of the Archdiocese of Athens, chaired by the Archbishop of Athens and All Greece, Mr. Jerome, the Minister of Education and Religious Affairs Niki Kerameos, referring to the issue of organic offices, spoke about the “restoration of dignity”, adding that “this event will be inscribed in History because His Beatitude managed to restore the dignity of the clergy by resolving the issue that had not been resolved for 77 years, until 2022.”

An important step was also taken in 2011 when church staff joined the Unified Payment Authority. According to church sources who spoke to “K”, until then the metropolitan decided on the permanence of the priest and sent him for printing to the National Printing House, and the salary of the metropolitan staff was sent to the state treasury. In 2011, it was decided that all employees in the public sector would go through the Unified Payment Authority.

During the Conference of the High Priestly Plenipotentiaries of the Holy Archdiocese of Athens, Mr. Jerome emphasized that the provision of organic positions to the clergy and laity is “a vision that began with the liberation of Rod.”