Why is there a Church-state showdown in Armenia?
Prosecutors opened a criminal case against the head of the Armenian Apostolic Church on Saturday - why?
The conflict between Church and state in Armenia escalated dramatically Saturday, when prosecutors opened a criminal case against the head of the Armenian Apostolic Church and barred him from leaving the country.
Karekin II, the Supreme Patriarch and Catholicos of All Armenians, was due to travel to Austria for a Feb. 16-19 meeting of the Armenian Apostolic Church’s Bishops’ Synod, of which he is president.
Armenian authorities accuse Karekin II, who has led the Armenian Apostolic Church since 1999, of the obstruction of justice. The Church dismisses the charges as unwarranted interference in its internal affairs.
What is the Armenian Apostolic Church? What set it on a collision course with the Armenian government? And is there a role for the Vatican in the dispute’s resolution?
What is the Armenian Apostolic Church?
The Armenian Apostolic Church is the ancient national church of Armenia, a landlocked country in the westernmost region of Asia. The Church’s headquarters is in Etchmiadzin, sometimes described as “the Vatican of Armenia.”
The Armenian Apostolic Church is one of the Oriental Orthodox Churches, a roughly 70 million-strong communion that also includes the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church and the Coptic Orthodox Church.
The Oriental Orthodox Churches diverged from the Chalcedonian tradition — represented today by the Catholic Church and Eastern Orthodox Churches — after the Council of Chalcedon in 451 A.D., largely because of differences over formulas used to define Christ’s nature.
In recent decades, the disagreement in the fifth century has come to be seen as primarily semantic, with all sides professing the same faith in Christ’s divinity and humanity, albeit in different language.
In a 1996 common declaration, Pope John Paul II and Catholicos Karekin I expressed their “conviction that because of the fundamental common faith in God and in Jesus Christ, the controversies and unhappy divisions which sometimes have followed upon the divergent ways in expressing it … should not continue to influence the life and witness of the Church today.”
Nevertheless, full communion between the Catholic Church and Armenian Apostolic Church remains a distant prospect — as Pope Leo XIV noted during a November 2025 address at the Armenian Apostolic Cathedral in Istanbul, Turkey.
Armenia became the world’s first state to embrace Christianity in 301 A.D. But the present-day Republic of Armenia dates back to 1991, when the nation gained independence from the Soviet Union. The republic offered Armenians a relatively secure, independent homeland for the first time in centuries, ending an era marked by persecution and genocide.
Armenia, a country roughly the size of the U.S. state of Maryland, has a population of roughly three million people. It is bordered by Turkey to the west, Georgia to the north, Azerbaijan to the east, and Iran to the south. Around 95% of the population belongs to the Armenian Apostolic Church and a mere 0.6% to the Catholic Church.
Yet the Armenian Apostolic Church has a total of 9 million members, meaning the majority of Armenian Orthodox Christians live outside of Armenia’s borders.
What caused the clash with the state?
The Armenian constitution defines the country as a secular republic in which “religious organizations shall be separate from the state.”
At the same time, it recognizes the unique role of the Armenian Apostolic Church “as a national church, in the spiritual life of the Armenian people, in the development of their national culture, and preservation of their national identity.”
This expresses a tension within Armenian national life. Although Church and state are formally separate, the Armenian Apostolic Church plays a major role in the public square.
On Jan. 4, 2026, Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan made a move that appeared to ignore the constitutional separation of Church and state.
Pashinyan, who has served as PM since 2018, posted a video in which he read aloud a statement that set out a “roadmap” for the reform of the Armenian Apostolic Church. The text called for the removal of Karekin II, the election of a new Catholicos of All Armenians, and the introduction of new measures to ensure financial transparency and upright conduct among clergy.
The video showed eight Armenian Orthodox bishops signing the document at Pashinyan’s residence. Two others, who were not present, also endorsed it.
Pashinyan, a member of the Armenian Apostolic Church and founder of the centrist Civil Contract party, is standing for re-election in the 2026 Armenian parliamentary elections. Some observers believe that his battle with the Church’s leadership is motivated by the poll, as senior clergy are perceived to be aligned with the political opposition.
But Pashinyan’s conflict with Karekin II is long-standing. In June 2025 he accused Karekin II of fathering a child, though he produced no evidence to back up the claim.
On Jan. 6, 2025 — Christmas Day in Armenia — Pashinyan called for a procession in support of reform from St. Gregory the Illuminator Cathedral to the Katoghike Holy Mother of God Church in the capital, Yerevan.
In a fiery address to participants, he said: “Today, the de facto head of our Church and his upper circle — the narrow group he has formed — are operating with a sectarian mindset, which means that we must liberate the Armenian Apostolic Holy Church from schism and return it to the people.”
One of the 10 signatories of the reform roadmap text was Bishop Gevork Saroyan, head of the Diocese of Masyatsotn. On Jan. 10, Karekin II removed Saroyan from his post, citing abuse of office.
On Jan. 14, a civil court ordered that Saroyan be reinstated. Karekin II responded on Jan. 27 by dismissing Saroyan from the clerical state.
On Feb. 14, the Prosecutor General of Armenia opened a criminal case against Karekin II, accusing him of obstructing the court order to reinstate Saroyan. The Church leader was also reportedly blocked from attending the Bishops’ Synod in Austria.
Karekin II’s legal representative described the move as “direct interference in the internal affairs of the Church.”
Pashinyan claimed that the meeting in Austria was part of a plan to create a “puppet Catholicosate” outside of Armenia.
He said: “I will not allow this. Armenia is not going to remain an observer. The reaction will be very tough. We will redirect the attention of those who have their eyes on the treasures of Etchmiadzin, hidden under the mask of benefactors, in a completely different direction. If additional measures are needed, they will be taken.”
Is there a role for the Vatican?
Pope Leo XIV received Karekin II in a private audience at Castel Gandolfo on Sept. 16, 2025. It is not known if the two men discussed the Church-state tensions in Armenia.
Pope Leo then granted Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan a private audience at the Vatican on Oct. 20, 2025. Again, the content of their discussion is unknown.
Could the Holy See play a role in calming the dispute? After all, it maintains good relations with both parties to the conflict. It has experts who understand the historical background and the current political context.
But if the Vatican proposed to serve as a mediator, it would likely be rejected. This is partly because Armenia is a small and close-knit nation. The idea of outside mediation is therefore unappealing.
Also, many Armenians believe the Holy See has become unduly close in recent years to its antagonistic neighbor Azerbaijan. They would dismiss the possibility that the Vatican could act as a neutral arbiter.
Yet Vatican history could help inspire efforts to resolve the Church-state dispute.
In an op-ed for the Armenian Weekly in December, Archbishop Khajag Barsamian compared the current crisis to that experienced by the papacy following the collapse of the Papal States in 1870.
Barsamian, the Armenian Apostolic Church’s representative to the Holy See, wrote: “In the Catholic world, the Holy See (the Vatican) and the State of Italy eventually defined their relationship clearly in the Lateran Treaty of 1929: one is a spiritual center with a worldwide flock; the other is a nation-state with its own political responsibilities. Armenia faces a similar need for clarification, adapted to our own history and circumstances.”
The development of such a treaty would require co-operation from both sides. But with the Armenian Church and state locked in an extraordinary battle of wills, a calmly negotiated end to the crisis currently seems unlikely.
I grew up around some Armenian immigrants and it gave me a glimpse into a very beautiful (and complex!) faith and history. Thank you for this look closer (and passing this along for fellow interested readers: https://www.commonwealmagazine.org/sacred-orientation-Aghajanian-arthur-armenian-apostolic-church ).
Very Byzantine move, Nikol