After almost 80 years devoted to the Romanian Orthodox Church, the Patriarch Teoctist passed away. July 30, 2007 will always remain a mourning day for all Christians, a day which we shall forever bear in our souls, one gloomy day in which an outstanding representative of Orthodoxy – the Patriarch of the Romanian Orthodox Church - made his way to everlastingness.
Having joined monarchal life at an early age, the Patriarch to be has gradually served all hierarchical church ladders to finally reach the highest position and supreme dignity in the Romanian Orthodox Church. During his more than 20 years as head of the Romanian Orthodox Church, through unalloyed strains, the Patriarch Teoctist has successfully managed to inflict the Church as the most reliable institution for the Romanian people.
Advocate for faith to all Romanians, he revived the Metropolitan Church of Basarabia in the early 90’s and established the Romanian Orthodox Metropolitan Church for Central and Northern Europe and for Occidental and Southern Europe, as well the Romanian Orthodox Episcopate for Romanian people in Hungary and Serbia.
During his two decades as a Patriarch, under the guidance of his Holiness Teoctist, 12 new patriarchates, 400 monasteries, and almost 2000 holy places emerged. The outmost evidence for the Patriarch’s vision of Christian union was the Holy Father Pope John Paul the 2nd’s visit to Bucharest in May 1999, Romania being the first orthodox country in the world that enjoyed the visit of a Pope.
Unpretentious and a steady promoter of meekness, his Holiness Father Teoctist would leave behind his legacy - an exemplary life – to the hierarchs of Romanian orthodoxy, to all real Christians, together with the dream he so ardently fought for: the People’s Salvation Cathedral, one „longing that intensifies as time goes by”.
As a godly homage, Romfilatelia, the company specialized in editing and trading Romanian postage stamps, introduces into circulation the philatelic issue In Memoriam Father Teoctist, Patriarch of the Romanian Orthodox Church (1986 - 2007).
