The Orthodox Sending Body receives permanent recognition from the Ministry of Justice and Security

On Tuesday, 29 September 2026, an event of special significance for the Orthodox Church in the Netherlands took place at the headquarters of the Dutch Ministry of Justice and Security in The Hague. At an official ceremony, an agreement was signed granting the Orthodox Sending Body (Orthodoxe Zendende Instantie, OZI) permanent recognition as a sending body for the Ministry of Justice and Security.

With this signature, a long process of consultation and institutional development comes to a close. Orthodox spiritual care in Dutch justice institutions now receives a lasting and fully-fledged place alongside the spiritual care offered by the other recognised religious and worldview traditions.

The signing in The Hague

The agreement was signed on behalf of the Dutch government by Ms Claudia van Bruggen, State Secretary for Justice and Security. On behalf of the two Orthodox church families that work together within the OZI, it was signed by His Eminence Metropolitan Athenagoras of Belgium, Exarch of the Netherlands and Luxembourg, as director of the Orthodox Church in the Netherlands Foundation (OKIN), and by His Eminence Archbishop Mor Polycarpus, as director of the Cooperative Association of Oriental Orthodox Churches in the Netherlands (SOKIN). The three parties placed their signatures on the agreement in The Hague on 29 September 2026. The agreement explicitly confirms that the recognition of the OZI as a sending body is henceforth valid for an indefinite period.

Present at the ceremony were representatives of various local Orthodox Churches and of the Chaplaincy Service (Dienst Geestelijke Verzorging, DGV). Among them were His Grace Bishop Arsenios of the Coptic Church in the Netherlands; priests from both Orthodox church families; Mr Rien Timmer, director of the Chaplaincy Service; Rev. Anne van Voorst, Chief Chaplain of the Chaplaincy Service within the Custodial Institutions Agency (Dienst Justitiële Inrichtingen, DJI); and several Orthodox chaplains who serve in Dutch justice institutions.

Care for those deprived of their liberty

In her address, State Secretary Van Bruggen underlined the importance of the recognition now achieved. She stated that it is right for the Orthodox Church, too, to take its own place within the Dutch system of spiritual care, alongside the other recognised traditions. The road to permanent recognition has been long, she noted, but the signing of the agreement now creates a stable framework within which Orthodox spiritual care can be developed further.

Particular attention was given to the great human and social importance of spiritual care in penitentiary institutions. A person who has been deprived of liberty continues to need personal accompaniment, the practice of faith, prayer and human closeness. Chaplains can be an important point of contact for detainees, accompanying them in questions of guilt and responsibility, reconciliation, hope and meaning, and in preparing for their return to society.

The signed agreement reflects this closely. It takes as its starting point the legal right of detainees to religious or worldview-based care, and it establishes that the OZI is responsible for the representativeness of the Orthodox Christian community and for the provision of Orthodox Christian spiritual care in the justice institutions.

A person deprived of liberty remains a person: still in need of prayer, of faith lived out, and of someone who comes near.

“A historic day”

Metropolitan Athenagoras expressed his deep gratitude to the State Secretary and, through her, to the Dutch government and to all who have contributed to the recognition process over the past years. He described 29 September 2026 as a historic day for the Orthodox Church in the Netherlands.

In his view, the official recognition is not only of administrative or institutional significance. It is also an acknowledgement of the place Orthodox Christians now hold in Dutch society, and of the pastoral responsibility the Orthodox Church bears towards its faithful, including when they find themselves in a penitentiary institution.

The Metropolitan recalled that the presence of Orthodox Christians in the Netherlands is by no means a recent phenomenon. Several centuries ago, Orthodox believers settled in the Dutch Republic and organised their church life there, with Amsterdam playing a special role. As a sign of this, Metropolitan Athenagoras presented the State Secretary with a copy of his doctoral thesis on the history of the Orthodox parish of Saint Catherine in Amsterdam. The study describes how Greek Orthodox merchants built up their own church community in Amsterdam as early as the eighteenth century and how they related to the Dutch society in which they lived. The gift symbolically underlined the continuity between centuries of Orthodox presence in the Netherlands, and the official recognition confirmed that day.

From provisional to permanent recognition

The signing was preceded by a lengthy process. On 16 December 2018, the Orthodox Church in the Netherlands Foundation (OKIN) and the Cooperative Association of Oriental Orthodox Churches in the Netherlands (SOKIN) jointly founded the Orthodox Sending Body, with a view to representative cooperation on behalf of the Orthodox faith communities in the Netherlands. A formal request for recognition as a sending body was then submitted to the government.

Following independent research and further consultation, the OZI was initially recognised for a period of four years. The minister at the time attached to this an evaluation of how the new sending body functioned. The signed agreement shows that this evaluation was completed on 18 May 2026, and that its outcome gave grounds to convert the temporary recognition into recognition for an indefinite period.

The new agreement also sets out a number of fundamental conditions that the OZI must continue to meet. These include its representativeness for the Orthodox Christian community; its support base, continuity and stability; and its accessibility to Orthodox church organisations that meet the established requirements.

The recognition is therefore both an important institutional step for the Orthodox Church in the Netherlands and a concrete strengthening of its pastoral mission. Orthodox detainees are now assured that, within the justice institutions, they can call upon spiritual care that is rooted in their own church tradition and, at the same time, professionally embedded in the Dutch system of spiritual care.

Two church families, one pastoral task

What makes the OZI distinctive is that it embodies cooperation between the local Orthodox Churches and the Oriental Orthodox Churches in the Netherlands. While both church families retain their own historical, canonical and theological traditions, within the OZI they work together on a task that unites them at the deepest level: offering pastoral closeness to Orthodox Christians who are held in Dutch justice institutions.

The agreement provides that the OZI guarantees the provision of Orthodox Christian spiritual care to the Orthodox faithful in these institutions and that it acts as the government’s partner in dialogue on matters concerning this spiritual care.

The official ceremony concluded with a reception at the Ministry of Justice and Security, where representatives of the government, the Orthodox Churches and the chaplaincy were able to meet one another further in a warm and informal atmosphere.

A new page

With the signing of 29 September 2026, a journey of many years has been completed, and at the same time a new page has been opened in the history of the Orthodox Church in the Netherlands: a page of lasting recognition, of responsibility, and of pastoral service to the human person, also and precisely, where that person finds himself or herself in a particularly vulnerable situation.