Bishop Abgar Hovakimyan
Primate of the Armenian Diocese of Canada
Bishop Abgar Hovakimyan (baptismal name Samvel) was born on July 23, 1972, in Batumi, Georgia.
From 1979 to 1989, he attended the Stepan Shahumyan Armenian Secondary School in Batumi.
From 1989 to 1995, he studied at the Gevorkian Theological Seminary in the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin. He successfully defended his thesis entitled "The Echoes of the Armenian Doctrinal Thinking in the Interpretation of the Gospel of Matthew by St. Nerses the Graceful”.
In October 1995, he was ordained into the diaconate by His Grace Bishop Anania Arabajyan, and was appointed to serve in the Mother See.
On June 02, 1996, he was ordained as a celibate priest by His Eminence Archbishop Shahe Ajemian in the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin, and given the priestly name of Abgar.
From 1996 to 2001, he served as spiritual pastor of Ajaria, Georgia.
From 2001 to 2004, Father Abgar studied at the faculty of Theology at the Theological University of Salzburg in Austria.
In 2004, he successfully defended his graduation thesis entitled "Armenian-Latin ecclesiastical relations in the 11-12 centuries’’ and received a Master of Divinity degree.
From 2004 to 2005, by the Pontifical Order of His Holiness Karekin II, Supreme Patriarch and Catholicos of All Armenians; Father Abgar was appointed to serve as Vicar General in the Armenian Diocese of Georgia.
On October 11, 2005, the Catholicos of All Armenians assigned him to serve as Vicar General at the Diocese of Syunik.
In April 2006, Father Abgar defended his doctoral thesis entitled “St. Dionysius the Areopagite in the Armenian Bibliography” and in May, in the St. Mesrop Mashtots Church of Oshakan, he received the rank of Archimandrite by His Grace Bishop Yeznik Petrosyan.
In 2010, Father Abgar left for Canada for one year of study.
In 2011, by the Pontifical Order of Catholicos of All Armenians; he was appointed to serve as the Locum Tenens in the Armenian Diocese of Bulgaria.
In May 2014, Father Abgar was elected to serve as the Primate of the Armenian Diocese of Canada.
On November 16, 2014, in the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin, he was consecrated, ordained, and elevated in the rank of Bishop, by His Holiness Karekin II, Supreme Patriarch and Catholicos of All Armenians.
His Grace is fluent in Russian, Georgian, and German.
