Theodosios (Hanna) of Sebastia (born 1965) is the Archbishop of Sebastia from the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem. Colloquially known as Atallah Hanna, Atallah and both meaning "gift of God" in Arabic and Greek, respectively. Theodosios, who was ordained on the 24 December 2005 at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, is the second Palestinian to hold the position of archbishop in the history of the diocese.
Early life; education
Archbishop Theodosios was born Nizar Hanna to Eastern Orthodox parents in the village of Rameh, Upper Galilee region of northern Israel.
Archbishop Theodosios studied Greek in Jerusalem, continuing his studies in Greece where he earned his Master of Theology from University of Thessalonica School of Theology in 1991.
Ecclesiastical career
That same year, 1991, Nizar Hanna returned to Jerusalem, where he was tonsured a monk with the name Theodosios and received ordination as a deacon. Also in 1991 he was elected a member of the Brotherhood of the Holy Sepulchre. In 1992 Theodosios was ordained a priest at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. A few days later he was elevated to the rank of archimandrite and placed in charge of the Arab section of the Patriarchate.
Active in public life, he has served as the spokesperson and Director of the Patriarchate's Arab Department, has taught in local schools, and lectured on Christianity at the Haifa Arab Teachers' College. For his devotion to ministry in the Holy Land, Theodosios was granted an honorary Doctor of Theology degree from the Sofia Theological Institute in Bulgaria.
In 2001 Theodosios was appointed by the late Patriarch Diodoros to serve as the official spokesperson for the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate in Jerusalem.
In 2005, after the dethronement of Patriarch Irenaios and his replacement with Patriarch Theophilos III, Theodosios was ordained Archbishop of Sebastia.
Political positions and the response of the authorities
Theodosios gained renown for his high-profile political activism, his outspoken denunciation of the occupation, and his stress upon the importance of Palestinian identity - positions that have made him popular with Arabs and unpopular with the Israeli authorities. Before being ordained archbishop, Theodosios has been arrested, detained and interrogated more than once by the Israeli authorities under various allegations of 'incitement'.
Theodosios has served as a member of the Constitutional Consultative Committee that worked on the third draft of the Palestinian constitution of March 2003 and was awarded the Jerusalem Prize by the Palestinian National Authority's Ministry of Culture in 2004. He is also one of the authors of the Kairos Palestine document together with Patriarch Michel Sabah, Naim Ateeq, Rifat Odeh Kassis, Nora Qort and others.
During the Second Intifada
Theodosios represented Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem Diodoros as part of a Palestinian ecumenical delegation invited by the World Council of Churches (WCC) to present before the United Nations Commission on Human Rights. At the WCC's Geneva headquarters on 19 October 2000, he stated that Palestinian Christians "are suffering, because they are Palestinians and they want to stay in their homeland in Palestine". Theodosios also accused Israel of practicing "ethnic cleansing against the Arabs, Muslim and Christian. Everyone thinks that there is a conflict between Arabs and Israelis. It is not a conflict between Arabs and Israelis, but an occupation by Israel." He called on all WCC churches to hold a special prayer for the Palestinian people and stated that they "should be enjoying all the rights of any other nation ... and should be enjoying their independence in their own state, the capital of which is Jerusalem."
The following year, on 10 October 2001, Theodosios participated with other Christian and Muslim leaders in a march from Jerusalem to the Bethlehem checkpoint to protest Israeli attacks on religious sites. Theodosios explained that, "We intend to conduct special prayers inside the Church of the Nativity for the sake of our martyrs."
Later that month, Theodosios sent a message to the United Nations Human Rights Commission calling for "immediate and rapid intervention" by the United Nations "to save the Palestinian people from the terrible massacres being carried out by the occupation forces". He also called for the Commission to pressure Israel to lift its blockade of Palestinian towns and villages.
On 21 January 2002, Israel requested that the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate take punitive action against Archimandrite Atallah Hanna, for criticizing Israeli policy in the Occupied Palestinian Territory.