# Laurent Cleenewerck

Laurent Cleenewerck (legally Cleenewerck de Kiev) is an academic and theologian, serving as the Oversight Council Chairman of EUCLID (Euclid University).
He is also a professor of international administration, public health and theology for EUCLID (Euclid University), and on the faculty of the Ukrainian Catholic University. He previously taught at Humboldt State University and was the rector of the Eureka Orthodox Church from 2007 to 2024.

## Upbringing and education

Cleenewerck was born in 1969 in Montpellier, France to a Flemish family, and spent part of his childhood in Connecticut. After completing his high school baccalauréat in 1986, he earned bachelors degrees in Computer Science, International Affairs, Finance and Business Administration. He holds a Licentiate in Sacred Theology from the St. Sergius Orthodox Theological Institute in Paris and a Master's in Ecumenical Studies from the Ukrainian Catholic University. He also pursued further studies at St. Tikhon's Orthodox Theological Seminary (Pennsylvania) in 2002-2004 and obtained a Doctorate of Science in the Study of Religion from the Universidad Rural de Guatemala (St Gregory Nazianzen Orthodox Institute; now St. Gregory Nazianzen Institute for Eastern Christian Studies). He also received a Ph.D. in public health from the Central University of Nicaragua in 2022.

## Professional life

Cleenewerck currently teaches theology, international administration and global health for EUCLID (Euclid University), as well as Ecumenical Methods for the Ukrainian Catholic University. He also occasionally serves as extension faculty for the Humboldt State University. He is the rector of St. Innocent's Orthodox parish in Eureka and engaged in public lecturing, ministry, as well as writing and research.
Prior to 2004, he worked as a manager in Paris and California.
He is a member of the Orthodox Theological Society of America.

## Ecclesiastical life

He is a presbyter of the Eastern Orthodox Church, ordained in the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the USA, received in the Orthodox Church in America in 2007. He was the rector of St Innocent Orthodox Church in Eureka, CA and held the rank of archpriest in the Orthodox Church in America. In 2024 he changed his jurisdiction and was accepted into the Archdiocese of Russian Orthodox Churches in Western Europe.

## Theological work

Cleenewerck's main ideas are presented in his study of the historical and theological causes of the current separation between Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy. He is an advocate of Eucharistic ecclesiology, which he articulates as Holographic anesthesiology. He is a proponent of non-partisan ecumenical dialogue with the ideal of a return to the basics of pre-Nicene orthodoxy.
Cleenewerck is an editor of the EOB (Eastern / Greek Orthodox Bible) of which the New Testament volume was published in 2010.
He is also engaged in public debates.

### Interfaith Award

Cleenewerck authored an academic paper on Christian - Muslim dialogue as part of the 2016 UN World Interfaith Harmony Week organized by EUCLID, which won the first prize award as an organization. In April 2016, he received an award from King Abdullah II of Jordan and delivered a speech at the award ceremony of the World Interfaith Harmony Week held in Amman, Jordan.

## Musical contributions

Under the name Laurent de Kiev, he has released a number of classic French poems adapted to music under the title "De Verlaine a Rimbaud" (2023) and "de Musset à Sardou" (2021).