Timeline

Key figures

Origin and history

The church Saint-Cosme-et-Saint-Damien of Avignon is an Orthodox church founded in 1979 under the leadership of Stéphane Charalambidis, then vicar of the Greek Metropolitan. This initiative follows an exhibition of icons organised around 1975 and lectures given by Olivier Clément and Virgil Gheorghiu. The parish, originally composed of ancient Catholics and Orthodox Christians of Greek origin, was first housed in a convent chapel and then in a municipal cultural centre. The celebrations, initially monthly, struggle to develop because of the absence of a fixed place and permanent service.

In the 1980s, Claude Hiffler, a doctor converted to orthodoxy, obtained a prefabricated rue du Poème-du-Rhône, built as a church by the faithful. A nuns, Christine, realized the iconostasis, while Marie-Noëlle Garrigou created the mural mosaics. The parish, under the patronage of Saints Como and Damien, acquires this local thanks to a bequest. The celebrations become bimonthly, presided notably by Victor Raïsi, Higoumène of the monastery of La Faurie. Lectures and a Slavic choir, led by Jean Baumann, animated parish life.

In 2001, the church was consecrated by Archbishop Jérémie Calligiorgis, marking its anchor in the Avignon religious landscape. In 2005, Claude Hiffler, the central figure of the parish, was ordained a deacon and then a priest in 2007. After his death in 2010, Frédéric Eymard (Father Georges) succeeded him. In 2012, the parish attracted a diverse community, including young people, soldiers and faithful of multiple origins, with French and multilingual liturgies. It plays an active role in ecumenism and pan-Orthodox unity, hosting the seat of the South-East Orthodox Brotherhood.

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