Karekin I
Karekin I
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Karekin I

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Karekin I

Karekin I (Armenian: Գարեգին Ա Սարգիսեան) (August 27, 1932 – June 29, 1999) served as the Catholicos of the Armenian Apostolic Church between 1994 and 1999. Previously, he served as the Catholicos of Cilicia from 1983 to 1994 as Karekin II (Armenian: Գարեգին Բ).

Karekin, born and baptized as Neshan Sarkissian, was born in the Armenian-populated village of Kesab in northern Syria, where he attended the Armenian elementary school. In 1946 he was admitted to the Theological Seminary of the Armenian Catholicosate of Cilicia and in 1949 ordained a deacon. In 1952, after having graduated with high honors, he was ordained a celibate priest and took the ecclesiastical name Karekin. He joined the order of the Armenian Catholicosate of Cilicia.

In 1955, he presented his doctoral thesis on the subject "The Theology of the Armenian Church, According to Liturgical Hymns Sharakans" and was promoted to the ecclesiastical degree of vardapet (archimandrite). In next year he served as a member of the faculty of the theological seminary in Antelias, Lebanon. He studied theology for two years at Oxford University and wrote The Council of Chalcedon and the Armenian Church, published in 1965 in London. Upon his return to Lebanon, he served as dean of the Antelias seminary.

From 1963, he became an aide to Catholicos Khoren I in which function he had many ecumenical contacts. He served as observer at the Second Vatican Council, the Lambeth Conference of 1968 and the Addis Ababa Conference of the heads of the Oriental Orthodox Churches. He lectured on theology, literature, history and culture at universities in Beirut, Romania, Moscow and Kotayyam (India).

His ecclesiastical career advanced quickly: in 1963 he was elevated to senior archimandrite and on January 19, 1964, he was consecrated bishop by Catholicos Khoren.

In 1971 he was elected Prelate of the Diocese of New Julfa in Isfahan, Iran.

In 1973, he received the rank of archbishop and was appointed Pontifical Legate of the Eastern Prelacy of the Armenia's Holy Apostolic Church of America (in New York) and in 1975 its Primate.

During his time in the United States, he took special care of the younger generation of Armenians and played a key role in the fundraising for Lebanon in 1976–1977.

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