[Congressional Record Volume 171, Number 151 (Tuesday, September 16, 2025)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E865]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




               WELCOMING ECUMENICAL PATRIARCH BARTHOLOMEW

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. SUMMER L. LEE

                            of pennsylvania

                    in the house of representatives

                      Tuesday, September 16, 2025

  Ms. LEE of Pennsylvania. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to welcome His 
All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, Archbishop of 
Constantinople-New Rome and spiritual leader of more than 300 million 
Orthodox Christians worldwide, to Washington, D.C.
  This week, His All-Holiness is visiting our Nation's Capital to 
receive the Templeton Prize, the most prestigious international award 
in religion and science. With this honor, he joins the ranks of Mother 
Teresa, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and the Dalai Lama. The recognition 
reflects not only his scholarship and spiritual leadership but his 
unwavering witness for peace, human dignity, and care for creation.
  For more than three decades as Ecumenical Patriarch, His All-Holiness 
has been a global voice for reconciliation among peoples of different 
faiths and traditions. He has also been one of the first religious 
leaders to insist that harming the environment is not simply a failure 
of policy but a moral failing. His leadership reminds us that 
stewardship of our planet is inseparable from justice for our 
communities.
  His leadership has been honored across the world. In 1997, he 
received the Congressional Gold Medal here in the United States, and he 
has been recognized internationally as one of the most influential 
figures of our time. Yet the true measure of his ministry lies not in 
awards, but in his call for peace over division, compassion over 
violence, and responsibility over indifference. As he has said, ``We 
have it in our power either to increase the hurt inflicted on our world 
or to contribute toward its healing. The choice is ours.''
  His life's work reminds us that building a better world depends on 
moral courage, the same courage we need to meet our own fights for 
justice at home.
  The people of Pennsylvania's 12th District, including the faithful of 
the Presentation of Christ Greek Orthodox Church in East Pittsburgh and 
St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Cathedral in Pittsburgh, are proud to share 
in this welcome.
  I ask my colleagues to join me in celebrating the extraordinary 
ministry of Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew and in congratulating him 
on this well-deserved honor.