Many Years, Your Beatitude!
Today—with deep love, respect and heartfelt thanksgiving—we mark the sixth Anniversary of the election of His Beatitude, Metropolitan Tikhon at the 17th All-American Council of the Orthodox Church in America, which was held at Holy Trinity Church, Parma, OH on November 13, 2012.
On behalf of the Holy Synod of Bishops and the clergy, monastics and faithful of the Orthodox Church in America, we assure Metropolitan Tikhon of our ongoing love and prayers today and in the many years to come. May our Lord continue to grant him peace, prosperity, safety, honor, health and length of days “rightly dividing” the word of God’s truth as he marks this milestone in his life and in the life of the Church!
Axios! Eis polla eti despota! May God grant you many, many years, Your Beatitude!
Metropolitan Tikhon was born in Boston, MA on July 15, 1966, the son of Francois and Elizabeth Mollard. After brief periods residing in Connecticut, France, and Missouri, he and his family settled in Reading, PA, where he graduated from Wyomissing High School in 1984. In 1988, he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in French and Sociology from Franklin and Marshall College, Lancaster, PA, after which he moved to Chicago.
In 1989, he was received into the Orthodox Church from the Episcopalian tradition and, in the fall of the same year, he began studies at Saint Tikhon’s Seminary. The following year he entered Saint Tikhon’s Monastery as a novice.
After receiving his Master of Divinity degree from Saint Tikhon’s Orthodox Theological Seminary in 1993, he was appointed instructor in Old Testament at the school. He subsequently served as Senior Lecturer in Old Testament and taught Master level courses in the Prophets and the Psalms and Wisdom Literature. He also served as an instructor in the seminary’s Extension Studies program, offering courses in the lives of the Old Testament saints, the liturgical use of the Old Testament, and the Old Testament in patristic literature. He collaborated with then-Igumen Alexander [Golitzin] in the publication of The Living Witness of the Holy Mountain, published by Saint Tikhon’s Seminary Press.
In 1995 he was tonsured to the Lesser Schema and given the name Tikhon, in honor of Saint Tikhon, Enlightener of North America and Patriarch of Moscow. Later that year, he was ordained to the Holy Diaconate and Holy Priesthood at Saint Tikhon’s Monastery. In 1998, he was elevated to the rank of Igumen, and in 2000 to the rank of Archimandrite. In December 2002, he was appointed Deputy Abbot of Saint Tikhon’s Monastery.
After his consecration to the episcopacy, he served as Auxiliary to the Metropolitan. He was nominated to fill the vacant See of Philadelphia and Eastern Pennsylvania at a special diocesan assembly on May 25, 2005. Two days later, he was elected to that ministry by the members of the Holy Synod of Bishops. He was installed as ruling hierarch of the Diocese at Saint Stephen Cathedral on October 29, 2005. He served as Bishop and later Archbishop of the Diocese until his election as Primate of the Orthodox Church in America on November 13, 2012.