Jonah Paffhausen

Metropolitan Jonah (born James Paffhausen, Jr.; October 20, 1959) is a retired American Eastern Orthodox bishop who served as the primate of the Orthodox Church in America (OCA) with the title The Most Blessed Archbishop of Washington, Metropolitan of All America and Canada from his election on November 12, 2008, until his resignation on July 7, 2012.

Metropolitan Jonah was the first convert to the Orthodox faith to have been elected as the primate of the OCA.

In 1978, he was received into the Orthodox Church at Our Lady of Kazan Church (Moscow Patriarchate) while studying at the University of California, San Diego.

He later transferred to UC Santa Cruz and helped to establish an Orthodox Christian Fellowship chapter there.

After graduation from UCSC, Paffhausen began graduate studies at St. Vladimir's Orthodox Theological Seminary, graduating in 1985 with an M.Div.

In 1988 he earned an M.Th.

in Dogmatic Theology.

In 1989, he began doctoral studies at Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California.

He interrupted his studies to spend a year in Russia, working for Russkiy Palomnik in the publishing arm of the Moscow Patriarchate.

During his time in Russia, he was introduced to Russian spirituality and its particular form of monastic life.

In this period, the Soviet Union was dissolved.

He subsequently joined Valaam Monastery as a novice, coming under the spiritual direction of Archimandrite Pancratius (Zherdev), the monastery's abbot, now a titular bishop of Troitsk.

While in Russia, Paffhausen was taken to see Fr. Pancratius' own spiritual father, Elder Cyril (Pavlov) of Trinity-St. Sergius Lavra to ask for advice in discerning his vocation.

Elder Kyrill blessed him to become a hieromonk.

In 1994, Paffhausen was ordained to the diaconate and priesthood.

In the following year, he was tonsured a monastic at St Tikhon's Monastery, South Canaan, Pennsylvania, receiving the religious name Jonah after St. Jonah of Moscow.

Hieromonk Jonah returned to his home state of California and was initially assigned as the priest of a mission parish, St Mary Magdalene of Merced, California.

While serving there, he worked with Father Jon Magoulias of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America (GOA) parish in Modesto, California to establish a mission parish under the auspices of the OCA in the Sonora/Jamestown/Columbia area of California.

This mission met in the historical Roman Catholic church of Saint Anna in the gold rush town of Columbia.

Father Jonah worked to establish a mission parish in Chico, California.

In the midst of these activities, his goal was to establish a monastic brotherhood.

He was given the obedience to establish a monastery at the Saint Eugene's retreat at Point Reyes, California by his bishop, Tikhon (Fitzgerald).

In late 1996, St. John of San Francisco Monastery was founded in Point Reyes.

During his tenure as abbot, Fr. Jonah's monastic community grew to more than fifteen members, and the monastery soon moved to larger facilities in Manton.

In this period, Fr. Jonah continued to work with mission parishes in Chico, Eureka, and Susanville, California, and in the Kona District, Hawaii.

Metropolitan Herman (Swaiko) had retired three months prior to the OCA's Fifteenth All-American Council, in connection with the 2005-08 financial scandal in the Orthodox Church in America.

The vacancy meant that a new Metropolitan would have to be elected at the council.

On the night before the election, the Synod asked Jonah to address questions from the delegates regarding the recent financial scandal in the OCA.

Jonah was only an auxiliary bishop at the time, and that for only ten days, but he was the only bishop at the time who was seen as untainted by the scandal.

In his largely-improvised address, Jonah heavily criticized how he had seen authority exercised by bishops and the OCA administration in the past.

He stated that hierarchical authority in the Orthodox Church should be about responsibility, accountability, and spiritual fatherhood, rather than "imperial aristocracy".

In 2008, Fr. Jonah was elevated to the rank of archimandrite and sent from the monastery to take on the duties of being an auxiliary bishop for the Orthodox Church in America's Diocese of the South.

In September of that year, he was officially elected to that position, and then on November 1 consecrated in Dallas as Bishop of Fort Worth, Texas led by Archbishop Dmitri (Royster), then locum tenens of the OCA's Metropolitan See.

Eleven days later, on November 12, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Bishop Jonah was elected as Metropolitan of the Orthodox Church in America.

Jonah's election as Metropolitan was an extraordinary occurrence in the history of the OCA, as he was the newest bishop in the OCA at the time.

On June 15, 2015, Metropolitan Jonah was released from the Orthodox Church in America in order for him to be accepted as a retired bishop of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia.

James Paffhausen was born in Chicago, Illinois, to James and Louise Paffhausen.

He was baptized in the Episcopal Church at St. Chrysostom's Episcopal Church.

He continued attending a parish of the Episcopal Church after his family relocated to La Jolla, California.

It was not until age 18 that he began preparation for chrismation in a San Diego Orthodox parish of the Moscow Patriarchate.