EM Galloway

FROM FACEBOOK Fr. Don Purdum, a man with zero Orthodox education was ordained seven months after meeting a self-described entrepreneur and pioneer in private finance who holds no theological degrees. For the sake of our Orthodox Christians who would be led away by his preaching, here are some things they should know. 1. Every Orthodox church on earth rejects the AOCC. Fr. Don Purdum represents the AOCC. This is not a canonical church. Constantinople, Moscow, Antioch, ROCOR, the OCA: all 14 autocephalous churches, independently, do not acknowledge the AOCC, regardless of whether they say they're canonical or not. 2. The AOCC's founder deposed himself by marrying in 1933. Aftimios Ofiesh, the AOCC's founder, broke his monastic vows and married a young parishioner in a civil ceremony. Under Orthodox canon law, a bishop who contracts marriage forfeits his office by the act itself. He never served as a bishop again. He died in 1966 asking to be buried "without any clergy of any kind." The canonical Orthodox world treated this as the end of the AOCC, and it was. 3. His "bishop" is off by 400 years on basic church history. The AOCC needs Aftimios's marriage to be a minor breach of etiquette, not a self-deposition. So "Archbishop" Daniels claims episcopal celibacy only became normative "after the 11th century or so." However the Council in Trullo mandated it in 692 AD. Canon 48 requires a bishop's wife to enter a monastery after consecration. Canon 12 reinforces it. These are ecumenical council canons; four hundred years is not a rounding error. If episcopal celibacy is what it actually is, ecumenical council legislation from the 7th century, then Aftimios deposed himself the day he married and every ordination flowing from that broken line is worthless. 4. Their "apostolic succession" has a 29-year hole in it. Archbishop Aftimios died in 1966. He asked to be buried "without any clergy of any kind." The next group to claim the AOCC name showed up in 1995. For three decades: no bishops, no priests, no church. Then in 2006, someone filed a 501(c)(3) with the old name. Filing paperwork with a state does not restore an apostolic line. A chain with a 29-year gap is just two pieces of chain. 5. He was "ordained" seven months after first encountering "Orthodoxy." Purdum met Wayne Daniels in spring 2023. By December 2023 he was a deacon. By mid-2024, a priest. In any canonical Orthodox church, catechesis alone takes one to two years before you're baptized, let alone ordained. No canonical bishop on earth would ordain someone who had been Orthodox for seven months. That only happens when there is no canonical bishop involved. Now, he posts his AI generated images about "Orthodoxy" and tradition, amassing many followers. 6. His education, his language, and his theology are all Protestant. Lancaster Bible College. Westminster Seminary. Dallas Theological Seminary. Protestant seminaries. Four years of dispensationalist training. His other degree is a political management MA. His own words: "Coming up Southern Baptist and later entrenched in the Bible Church movement." The AOCC chaplaincy website says they blend "liturgical/catholic/sacramental, evangelical, and charismatic" streams, which is the Protestant convergence movement wearing a cassock. They recognize six sacraments, not seven. Purdum writes about personal exorcisms and seeing angels in his home in language you could paste into any Pentecostal testimony and nobody would notice. 7. The man who ordained him has no education at all. "Archbishop" Wayne Daniels's own website says he "holds no degrees." He calls himself "a trailblazer in the apostolic and prophetic movement" whose ministry produced "countless miracles, healings, signs & wonders." Before the AOCC he ran a Protestant church plant in Missouri and belonged to another unrecognized body. He also calls himself "a seasoned entrepreneur, business strategist, and pioneer in private finance and ecclesiastical law." 8....