Laurus

Laurus is a genus of evergreen trees belonging to the Laurel family, Lauraceae. The genus includes three or more species.

Species

The number of species in the genus has not yet been fully resolved. The following may or may not be included.

Fossil history

Fossils dating from before the Pleistocene glaciations show that species of Laurus were formerly distributed more widely around the Mediterranean and North Africa, when the climate was more humid and mild than at present. It is currently thought that the drying of the Mediterranean basin during the glaciations caused Laurus to retreat to the mildest climate refuges, including southern Spain, Portugal and the Macaronesian islands. With the end of the last glacial period, L. nobilis recovered some of its former range around the Mediterranean.

Laurus (Škurla)

Metropolitan Laurus (Slovak: Metropolita Laurus, secular name Vasil' Michalovič Škurla, Russian: Василий Михайлович Шкурла; January 1, 1928, Ladomirová, Czechoslovakia – March 16, 2008, Jordanville, New York) was First Hierarch of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia, the fifth cleric to hold that position. Born in Czechoslovakia, he emigrated to the United States in 1946 after World War II with brothers from his monastery. They joined the Holy Trinity Monastery in Jordanville, New York, established in 1928 by the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia.

Father Laurus was ordained to the priesthood in 1954 and advanced within the church. Late in his life, after the fall of the Soviet Union, he negotiated the fourth ROCOR agreement, which reunited ROCOR to the Russian Orthodox Patriarchate based in Moscow. In 2007 he participated in a joint celebration of the Divine Liturgy with the Patriarch of Moscow at Christ the Saviour Cathedral in Moscow.

Life

Vasil' Michalovič Škurla was born on January 1, 1928, in the Rusyn-inhabited village of Ladomirová (Hungarian: Ladomérvágása), Czechoslovakia (now Slovakia), to Rusyn-Slovak Michal Ivanovič and Elena Michalovna Škurla. His family was Orthodox Christian in an area of the former Sáros County of the Austro-Hungarian Empire that was strongly influenced by Roman Catholicism. He was baptised by archimandrite Vitaly (Maximenko).