stauropegion

English

Alternative forms

Etymology

From Byzantine Greek σταυροπήγιον (stauropḗgion). See also stauropegial.

Noun

stauropegion (plural stauropegia)

(initially) In Eastern Orthodoxy, the placement of a cross by a bishop which symbolises his approval of the construction of a church or monastery on the site the cross is placed.
(later) In Eastern Orthodoxy and Eastern Catholicism, an autonomous Orthodox church body (church, monastery, brotherhood, lavra, theological school) which does not answer to any local hierarch, but is ruled directly by the highest authority of the church, i.e. the primate of the said church (e.g. a Patriarch) or in the case of the Russian Orthodox Church between 1721 and 1918 by the Most Holy Synod. Similar to a personal prelature.
- 1987, John Philip Thomas, Private Religious Foundations in the Byzantine Empire, Dumbarton Oaks, pages 239, 242:
  Taronas' church also bore the name of St. Nicholas, and he managed to obtain a patriarchal stauropegion for it. (p. 242) If the patriarch recognized these stauropegia as valid charters of foundation, the bishop would stand to lose his traditional rights over these institutions. (p. 239)
- 2008, “Univ Monastery Becomes Subject to Greek Catholic Patriarch”, in RISU‎:
  A stauropegial monastery (monasterium stauropegiaceum), in other words, under patriarchal jurisdiction (monasterium iuris patriarchalis), is a monastery which is subject directly to the patriarch (can. 434 Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches). The CCEC distinguishes 3 types of jurisdictional status of monasteries (can. 434): a) papal, b) patriarchal, c) episcopal. Consequently, granting the Lavra of the Holy Dormition in Univ the status of stauropegion means raising it to patriarchal status.
- 2012, “The autocephalous Byzantine ecclesiastical province of Bulgaria/Ohrid. How independent were its archbishops?”, in Bulgaria Mediaevalis, number 3/2012 (1), page 362:
  Theophylact's testimony may be found in his Letter no. 82 to a deacon in the patriarchal administration. Theophylact emphasises to him that the patriarch did not have rights of consecration in the archbishopric, as it was autocephalous. The case concerned an obstinate monk in the bishopric of Kičava who had begun to erect a chapel, protected by a patriarchal stauropegion, against the archbishop's wishes.