Ezekiel Tsoukalas

Ezekiel Tsoukalas (Greek: Ιεζεκιήλ Τσουκαλάς; 1913 – 1 July 1987) was a Greek priest and the first Archbishop of Australia, in the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of Australia.

Tsoukalas was an assistant Bishop in the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America between 1950 and 1959. He had served as a bishop in Boston and Chicago. He had been Assistant Director of Holy Cross Greek Orthodox School of Theology in Brookline, Massachusetts in 1943 and elevated to Director in 1949.^[1]

Archbishop of Australia

Ezekiel Tsoukalas of Nazianzos was elected the fourth Metropolitan of Australia and New Zealand in February 1959. He replaced Metropolitan Theophylactos Papathanasopoulos, the third Metropolitan who was killed in a car crash in 1958. On 1 September 1959 the Metropolis of Australia and New Zealand was elevated to Archdiocese and Metropolitan Ezekiel was elevated to Archbishop.^[2] In 1970 the Metropolis of New Zealand was created, so Archbishop Ezekiel became Archbishop of Australia.

In August 1974 the Ecumenical Patriarchate promoted Archbishop Ezekiel to the Metropolis of Pisidia where he remained until 1987. He died in Athens in July 1987.

On 3 February 1975, the Holy Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate unanimously elected Metropolitan of Miletoupolis Stylianos Harkianakis, lecturer at the University of Thessaloniki, as the new Archbishop of Australia.

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