BISHOP MKHITAR TER-MKRTCHYAN

1916-1920 (Years of Leadership)

BISHOP MKHITAR TER-MKRTCHYAN (Holy Etchmiadzin official “Calendar”, 1923. “Ararat” Magazine, 1909, page 812).

Bishop Mkhitar Ter-Mkrtchyan was born in 1864 in Tsughrut village (Georgia). He studied in the Gevorkian Theological Seminary of the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin. Bishop Mkhitar Ter-Mkrtchyan also graduated from the Nersisyan Theological School of Tbilisi.

In 1893, he was ordained as a celibate priest.

Bishop Mkhitar Ter-Mkrtchyan conducted different spiritual services. For a long period, he served as the Vicar of the Diocese in Nor Nakhijevan and later in Aleksandropol.

Bishop Mkhitar Ter-Mkrtchyan was elected as a member of the Synod of the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin by the order of Mkrtich I Vanetsi Khrimyan (commonly known as Khrimyan Harik)

In 1908, Bishop Mkhitar Ter-Mkrtchyan was appointed to administer the Armenian Diocese in Astrakhan, Armenia, by the order of the Locum Tenens of the Catholicos of All Armenians, Archbishop Gevorg Chorekchyan.

On October 25, 1909, he was consecrated as a Bishop.

From 1916 - 1920, Bishop Mkhitar Ter-Mkrtchyan was the Head of the Diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Orthodox Holy Church in Georgia.

Bishop Mkhitar Ter-Mkrtchyan wrote a book entitled “At the Dawn of Christianity”, translated from Russian, which was printed in the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin in 1903.