FINNISH ORTHODOX CHURCH

FINNISH ORTHODOX CHURCH. Although overwhelmingly Lutheran by confession, modern Finland also counts a small Orthodox Church that, together with the Lutheran Church, enjoys official status as a state-supported institution. The origins of Christianity in Finland go back at least to the 12th c., and possibly earlier to the founding of the Valaam Monastery. Although the country became Lutheran in 1523, the eastern part remained Orthodox, even through a 17th-c. Swedish persecution. Orthodoxy grew when Finland came under Russian rule in 1809. The country gained independence in 1917 and autonomy was granted the Finnish Church by the Ecumenical Patriarch (q.v.) in 1923. Today it counts an archbishop, two metropolitans, and one vicar bishop attached to the archbishop’s see (i.e., three dioceses). The theological faculty is affiliated with the university at Joensuu, and there are two monastic communities. The majority of Finnish Orthodox derive from Karelia, the eastern provinces lost to the Soviet Union in the Russo-Finnish wars of 1939 through 1944. The resettlement and scattering of Orthodox Finns throughout the rest of the country following that war continue to pose difficulties for this minority church, although in the most recent years the church has attracted converts and has begun to grow.