Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Chicago (Agenzia Fides) - His Holiness Mar Dinkha IV Catholicos-Patriarch of the Assyrian Church of the East passed away on Thursday morning, March 26 at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. Patriarch Mar Dinkha was 80 years old and the cause of death was a virus infection and pneumonia. The funeral service will be held on April 8 at St. George Church in Chicago.
Patriarch Dinkha, the 111th Patriarch of the Church of the East, was consecrated as Patriarch on October 17, 1976, serving 39 years at his post. His tenure was the tenth longest in church history. Patriarch Dinkha was born in Iraq on September 15, 1935. He was appointed to the ministry in Urmia, Iran. He was consecrated as bishop on February 11, 1962. He became patriarch after Patriarch Eshai Shimun was assassinated in 1976. Patriarch Dinkha is credited with rebuilding the church, which had neared the brink of destruction after the assassination of his predecessor, and brought stability and peace to a church in turmoil. After seven centuries, Mar Dinkha IV was the first Patriarch chosen by election and not by succession.
Since his election, Patriarch Mar Dinkha transferred the patriarchal seat from the mountains foothills of Iraqi Kurdistan to Chicago. Now the main part of the Assyrian Church is concentrated in communities in diaspora scattered in America, Europe and Oceania.
Patriarch Mar Dinkha, during his long patriarchal tenure, met Pope John Paul II, Pope Benedict and Pope Francis. The meeting with the current Successor of Peter took place on October 2. On 11 November 1994 Patriarch Mar Dinkha and Pope John Paul II signed the Joint Declaration on Christology, where it is recognized that the Assyrian Church of the East and the Catholic Church confess the same faith in Christ, and admit that Christological disputes of the distant past were largely due to misunderstandings. In the past there was no mutual excommunication between the two Churches, and there has been for some time a bilateral theological dialogue that will also have to face the theme of the constitution and the nature of the Church, which also includes the study on the ministry the Bishop of Rome. (GV) (Agenzia Fides 27/03/2015)
