Grigorije (Durić)

Grigorije Durić (; born Mladen Durić; 17 December 1967) is a Serbian Orthodox archbishop who has been serving as the head of the Eparchy of Düsseldorf and Germany since 2018. He is a former head of the Eparchy of Zachlumia, Herzegovina, and the Littoral.

Early life Durić was born in Vareš, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Yugoslavia. He spent his childhood in the village of Planinica, where his family lived, originally from the Old Herzegovinian village of Banjani in the vicinity of Bilećko Lake.

Career Durić was ordained a monk on 23 June 1992 in the Ostrog Monastery, from where he went with Bishop Atanasije to the renovated Tvrdoš Monastery near Trebinje. He was ordained a hierodeacon on 17 July 1992 and a hieromonk on 19 August 1992. He became the abbot of Tvrdoš on 12 May 1996 and the archimandrite on 19 August 1997. He graduated from the Faculty of Theology in 1994, and from 1995 to 1997 he was in postgraduate studies in Athens.

At the regular session of the Council of Bishops of the Serbian Orthodox Church on 13–15 May 1999, Durić was elected vicar bishop of Hum in the Eparchy of Zachlumia, Herzegovina, and the Littoral. At the extraordinary session on 13–18 September 1999, after the withdrawal of Bishop Atanasije, Grigorije was elected to the acting diocesan bishop. He was enthroned as the bishop of Zahumlje and Herzegovina by the Metropolitan of Montenegro and the Littoral, Amfilohije on 3 October 1999, with the blessing of Patriarch Pavle. Since his arrival to Germany, the Serbian Orthodox Church has increasingly started doing services in German.

In 2014, Durić received his doctorate in theology from the Orthodox Theological Faculty in Belgrade. In 2017, he was appointed a member of the Senate of Republika Srpska for a seven-year term. He wrote the book Across the Threshold, for which he received the Kočić Pen Award in December 2017, as well as the Kočić Book Award.

Views Durić is an ecumenist. He is a strong critic of Serbian president Aleksandar Vučić, provoking hostility from the Serbian Orthodox Church and the media close to the government. In July 2020, he criticized the Serbian government for providing funds for the Temple of Saint Sava instead of funding hospitals during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Serbian Orthodox Church responded by accusing him of anti-clericalism and anti-Serbdom. In the midst of the anti-government protests in Serbia after the proposed reintroduction of the COVID-19 curfew, the deputy mayor of Belgrade, Goran Vesić, called him an inspirator of the protest, and he filed criminal charges against Grigorije for "incitement to murder".

Orders and decorations

Publications Books written by Bishop Grigorije:

Theology "Dolazi čas i već je nastao" (The Moment Is Coming and It's Already Here), 2004 "Biti sa drugim: Relaciona ontologija Jovana Zizjulasa" (Being with the Other: Relational Ontology of John Zizioulas), 2018

Fiction "Priča o starom kralju" (Story of an Old King), 2009 (novel) "Vera, radost života" (Faith, the Joy of Life), 2010 (novel) "Lazar", 2010 (novel) "Preko praga" (Across the Threshold), 2017 (novel) "Gledajmo se u oči" (Let's Keep the Eye Contact), 2019 (book of interviews) Nebeska dvorišta (2022) Stranac u šumi (2024) Jedni drugima potrebni (2026)