In his commentary, "May a Protestant, an Armenian Nevertheless, Have a Word," in TAR 
Int’l, on July 14, 2001, Revered Giragos H. Chopourian, Ph.D., compares the Church 
Unity issue, ...to the Titanic clashing with the glacier.  He goes on to say, All suffer when 
the ‘ship’ sinks.


Unfortunately, what the good Reverend is saying is for the most part true.   For those who 
don’t know him, I would like to point out that Reverend Chopourian is a very 
conscientious and concerned Armenian.  His concern and love for his Christian faith and 
for his fellow Armenians, regardless of denomination, is without question.  However, as 
futile and as near impossible as he feels it would be to bring total reunification to our 
divided Armenian Apostolic Churches in North America, compels me to respond. 


To begin with, though there may be many among us who would agree with Reverend 
Chopourian’s analogy, I cannot bring myself to believe that the separation continues 
because individuals have personal loyalties for their area churches.  In this regard, our 
Coalition for Church Unity took a survey in 1986, and the overwhelming majority opted 
for total reunification at that time.


In his commentary, Reverend Chopourian further states:  "It is an interesting phenomenon 
that many Christians are loyal to a church or a church building, allowing changes over 
their dead body."  I don’t know where the good Reverend got this impression, but I have 
yet to meet an Apostolic Armenian who would rather die than go to another Apostolic 
church.  Complain?  Yes!  This is a traditional Armenian trait, but dying for a complaint, 
isn’t.


Of course, during the ‘heydays’ of our opposing Tashnag and Rhamgavar politicals, we 
may have had such people.  And if there are any remaining today, I would suggest that 
these are our throwbacks and that they are not representative of today’s majority.  In fact, 
during the fifties when President Eisenhower had to send our U.S. Marines into Lebanon, 
our opposing Armenian politicals had already killed more than 200 Armenians between 
them, but when peace was finally re-established, both sides showed up for church 
services as though nothing had happened.  Many died, but they didn’t die for religion.  


But if, (as Reverend Chopourian points out), this is where we’re at today, then both first 
generation Prelacy and Diocese churchgoers would have been much better off if they had 
bought guns and built divided Tavloo lodges instead of churches.  Moreover, if the stone, 
bricks, and mortar in our churches are more important to us than the same Christian God 
we pray to, and I might add, in the very same way, then the celebration of our 
1,700-year-old Armenian Apostolic Christian faith would have been better served if we 
looked on St. Gregory as more of a super real estate agent rather than an Illuminator.


When I look back to when our feuding politicals severed our Armenian American 
Apostolic Churches in two, or in the irresponsible way they continued resisting all efforts 
for reunification, I can’t help but wonder how they can justify what they did and still call 
themselves, Christian.


I also wonder if they have ever taken the time to imagine the many wonderful benefits 
we’ve lost by weaning our later generations on their short-sighted it’s not us - it’s them 
logic.


To sum it up, houses of worship are only way stations.  The real church should be in our 
hearts and not in the edifices we pray in.  But as my late father-in-law once said about 
Jesus Christ when he came into Jerusalem on a donkey: "Hisoos-uh esh-oon khosk 
hash-gu-tzoozt, puyts murtots chee gur-tzuv."    (Jesus was able to make the ass 
understand, but mankind he couldn’t.)


Joseph Vosbikian