Wasgen I.

Wasgen I. on an Armenian postage stamp (1995)

Wasgen I. (born September 20, 1908 in Bucharest , † August 18, 1994 in Yerevan ) was the "Supreme Patriarch and Catholicos of All Armenians", ie of Echmiadzin , in the Armenian Apostolic Church .

Wasgen's gravestone in front of the Etschmidsin Cathedral

Lewon Garabed Paltschian was the only child of Abraham Paltschian and his wife, an Armenian family who fled from Istanbul to Romania after the Hamidian massacres in 1895/96 . He received his school and university education in Bucharest. He studied at the former Armenian School and at the German Goethe College . He then worked as a publicist and teacher. In September 1943 he was ordained a monk priest in Athens by the Armenian Primate of Greece and as such was given the name Wasgen. It was during this time that he became a wardapet . In 1948 he was appointed primate of Romania and in 1951 by Katholikos Geworg VI. ordained bishop by Echmiadzin (then Soviet Republic of Armenia ) . After a carefully arranged tour of the whole of Armenia, he was elected on September 29, 1955 in Etschmiadzin (with 125 of 137 votes), and on October 2 there he was consecrated and anointed as "Supreme Patriarch and Catholicos of All Armenians".

Wasgen I. consecrated a total of 65 bishops during his term of office, carried out the Myron consecration, which had been prevented since 1926, six times, traditionally every seven years (most recently in 1991), renovated churches and buildings in and near the Catholic, ensured the translation of the Bible into New Armenian and was the first Catholicos to travel extensively to the congregations of the Armenian diaspora and to other church leaders. In March 1956 he visited the Catholic Mechitarists in Venice, and in 1970 the Vatican for the first time.

Through him the Catholic of Echmiadzin became a member of the World Council of Churches in 1962 . During his almost forty years in office, Armenia gained independence. In 1991 he took the swearing-in of the first president. In 1993 the Armenian Parliament awarded him the honorary title "National Hero of Armenia".

After a long illness, he died of cancer in old age. On August 28, 1994, he was buried in front of Etchmiadzin Cathedral.

literature

• Zaven Arzoumanian: The Armenian Apostolic Church In Recent Times, 1955-1995. A Path to the 21st Century. Pontificate of Vasken I, Catholicos of All Armenians . Burbank, California 2010.

Individual evidence

1. ^ Vazgen I. Encyclopaedia Britannica, accessed January 24, 2014 . 

Web links

• Audio interview with the head of the Armenian Church Wasgen I. in the online archive of the Austrian Media Library (Armenian with German translation)

predecessor	Office	successor
Georgios VI.	Catholicos of the Armenian Apostolic Church 1954 - 1994	Karekin I.