St. George's Cathedral. Istanbul, Turkey. August 2017

Church News 2:On 31 August 2020, His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew signed the Patriarchal and Synodal Acts of Inclusion of four new saints in the calendar of the Orthodox Church in the Patriarchal Church of St.George in Constantinople.The Acts had been read aloud by the Chief Secretary of the Holy and Sacred Synod, the Very Reverend Archimandrite Ioakeim.The new saints are: the Athonite Fathers Monk Daniel Katounakiotis;Monk Iosif Isichastis;Hieromonk Efraim Katounakiotis;and Metropolitan Kallinikos of Edessa and Pella.Then the Patriarch and other Synod members signed the Acts.*
On 1 September, the Feast of the Indiction, Ecclesiastical New Year,was marked resplendently at the Patriarchal Church of St.George, the large cathedral in the Phanar.Concelebrating the Divine Liturgy were His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew; His Eminence Archbishop Elpidophoros of America; His Eminence Archbishop Nektarios of Anthedon, Commissioner of the Holy Sepulchre to Constantinople (Patriarchate of Jerusalem and All Palestine); and several other hierarchs and clerics.His Beatitude Patriarch Theophilos III of Jerusalem and All Palestine was unable to attend because some members of the Brotherhood of the Holy Sepulchre had fallen ill with COVID-19.
Following the liturgy, the solemn Indiction ceremony was held, with Patriarch Bartholomew reading the Act of Indiction aloud and signing it in the Codex of the Great Church of Christ.Then the other assembled hierarchs signed it in the proper order.
The previous evening, Vespers of the Indiction had been celebrated at the Monastery of Zoodochos Pigi, the Theotokos of the Life-giving Fountain,in Valouklia, Constantinople, with many hierarchs and faithful attending.*
Also on 1 September, the new composition of the Holy and Sacred Synod of the Patriarchate was announced. The new members will serve from 1 September 2020 to 28 February 2021:
Ioannis of Pergamos;
Athenagoras of Mexico;
Amvrosios of Karpathos and Kasos;
Apostolos of Militis;
Theoliptos of Iconium;
Andreas of Arkalochori,Kastelli and Viannos;
Paisios of Leros,Kalymnos and Astypalaia;
Cleopas of Sweden;
Maximos of Selyvria;
Makarios of Australia;
Kyrillos of Imvros and Tenedos;
and Maximos of Switzerland.*