Archdiocese of the Goths and the Northlands

The Archdiocese of the Goths and the Northlands is an Eastern Orthodox church affiliated with the Russian True Orthodox Church (also known as "catacombists", a splinter group not to be confused with the Russian Orthodox Church). It was established in 1994 in Moscow by Aleksey Sievers, who was ordained archbishop under the name Amvrosij (Ambrosius). It has been a registered ecclesiastical and religious body in Sweden since 2008.[1] Ambrosius ordained a "Bishop of Gotland" in Sweden, Teodorik Sutter, in December 2011.

Logo used by gotark.org (Gothic runic text reading ufaraibiskopei goþansk jah norþlandsk "Archdiocese of Goths and Northlands")

It claims apostolic succession through the Russian True Orthodox Church, and territorial jurisdiction deriving from the Metropolitanate of Gothia and Kaphas, the church of the Crimean Goths in the Principality of Theodoro. The Metropolitanate of Gothia was under the jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarch until 1783, when, subsequent to the Russian conquest of the Crimea, it was transferred to the Russian Orthodox Church.[2] The bishop's chair was left vacant starting in 1786. The Archdiocese of the Goths also claims territorial jurisdiction of Götaland, Sweden, based on the history of the christianization of Scandinavia.

It also claims to be the earliest Church authority in Scandinavia, with presence preceding the Ansgar mission, allegedly with the (now-ruined) St Laurentius Church in the island of Gotland.[3][4]

According to Aleksey "Ambrosius" Sievers, Christianity came to the Goths as early as the mid-1st century by a missionary journey of Andrew the Apostle, long before their conversion to Arianism under the episcopate of Ulfilas. "The 'eastern' ecclesiastical jurisdiction in Västergötland, Östgötaland and in Gotland was so obvious to anyone at the time that even Rome sent its missionary bishop, Saint Ansgar, to Svealand where Christianity in comparison was relativelly weak at that time. It's fairly realistic to speak of Old Gothic (Byzantine) and Celtic (a little later Anglo-Saxon) influence in Sweden, instead of Roman [...]".[5]

These claims run counter to the general 20th-century consensus of historians, but there is some more recent research which seems to corroborate that Christianity may have been present in Sweden earlier than previously thought, from as early as the 8th or 9th century, via Byzantine transmission.[6] This supposed cultural contact reflects the Viking Age (9th-century) Swedish expansion eastward, establishing the so-called Rus' Khaganate on the margins of the Byzantine sphere of influence.[7]