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→Arguments against OCA autocephaly
*"Specific canons exactly characterizing autocephaly are not to be found in ecclesiastical legislation" (p. 36).
*Establishing missions in what was then part of the Russian Empire (Alaska), a few churches in major industrial centers, and then wooing numerous ex-[[Uniate]]s to its fold did not canonically give the Church of Russia sole ecclesiastical jurisdiction over an entire continent.
*The It is against canonical and traditional order for a [[diocese]] regarded as having been in [[schism]] (as the Metropolia had officially been by Moscow Patriarchate from 1933 to 1970) to be suddenly granted autocephaly.*Autocephaly by its nature includes a total territorial definition, which Moscow's [[tomos]] does not make, especially because it kept dozens of parishes on for itself in North American soil even after America and makes no claim over the proclamationmajority of Orthodox parishes in America. This is a "paradox... unheard of in the Orthodox chronicles" (p. 51).*No autocephalous Church may extend its jurisdictional boundaries without the consent of the whole Church (in Russia's case, thus not truly recognizing those boundaries were defined in 1591).*Autocephaly must require the full agreement of the people and leadership in the territory in question, but the OCA's territorial claimautocephaly only required the agreement of a minority of Orthodox America. St. [[Tikhon of Moscow]] said this regarding the [[Church of Georgia]], that its autocephaly must be "the universal and fully agreed upon wish of the people" (p. 49).
===Historical arguments===
*Autocephaly normally proceeds along secular boundaries only because Orthodoxy has been the established Church in those nations.
*Autocephaly has been proclaimed multiple times, but always failed without the assent of the whole Church. (The Churches of Carthage, Mediolana (Milan), the First Justiniana, Ochrid, Trnovo, Ipek, and Iberia are all given as examples by Patr. Athenagoras on p. 37.)
*The period of Russian Orthodox expansion out of Alaska is also the same period during which other Orthodox jurisdictions were established on American soil.
*The various Orthodox communities in North America did not always recognize Russian jurisdiction; they were often quite isolated and had no real contact with the Russian hierarchy. Thus, they saw themselves as beholden to their mother churches, not to Moscow.
*Obsessive focus on jurisdictional issues obscures the true work of the Church, especially regarding its youth.
*Russian Orthodoxy remains disunified on American soil, remaining under three jurisdictions; the OCA's autocephaly failed to produce unity even for the Russians.
*The issue of unity in the [[diaspora]] had already been referred to the agenda of an upcoming Great and Holy Synod of the Orthodox Churches. Moscow's unilateral move was an affront to the community of the Church. "For this reason we are at a loss to explain the haste shown by the Russian Orthodox Church in announcing as Autocephalous a relatively small section of the Russian Orthodox Diaspora in America, and conferring upon this Church a title disproportionate with reality, after having only recently recognized her jurisdiction" (p. 43).
*The name "The Orthodox Church in America" is a misnomer, as the body only comprises a minority of Orthodox faithful in America and is not representative of Orthodox America, but mainly represents a certain subsection of Slavic Orthodoxy in America (particularly ex-Uniate, Russianized Carpath-Russians).
*Moscow's act creates confusion regarding the true nature of canonicity.
==Source==
