was The Holy mass on the eve of the Orthodox Christmas the Orthodox Bishop’s residence in Istanbul so solemn as not in a long time: The reason for that, because in spite of the violent Moscow protests of the recognized Patriarch Bartholomew I. during the service, a new Orthodox Church, that of the Ukraine. Before the faithful of the honorary Chairman, presented over 300 million Orthodox in the presence of the Ukrainian President, Petro Poroshenko, a corresponding independence decree. Poroshenko compared this step in a short speech, the independence of his country from 1991.
The Patriarch of Moscow, Kirill I, said, however, the papal decree immediately with anger, snorting null and void. Patriarch Bartholomew does not have the right to decide on the independence of the Ukrainian Church. This was previously for centuries, the Patriarch of Moscow; their independence is the same for Cyril, and with him the whole Russian leadership, of a great defeat. Orthodox Orthodox in Ukraine to be in the future prohibited from participating in trade fairs in the new independent Orthodox Church, warned Cyril on Sunday afternoon.
impact difficult to estimate
The so-called autocephaly, to the independence of the Church, was a since the collapse of the Soviet Union in Ukraine a required step. But first, Poroshenko had received from the responsible Patriarch of the Eastern Church 2018 support for this from Moscow since the fighting desire. A “Tomos”, which is a Church legally-sanctioned Declaration of independence from Constantinople (Istanbul), was since then, over a period of months in preparation.
The worldly implications of this step are difficult to predict. After all, 65 percent of the Orthodox churches in Ukraine belong to the Moscow Patriarchate. Pessimists now fear a fight to houses of worship, monasteries and the associated real estate. The faithful wanted to pray in churches of the Moscow Patriarchy, entitled to the protection of the Kremlin, threatened to Russia at the end of November. You could be forced, in addition to the Crimea the country Ukraine marks to be placed under Russia’s protection, was not the Russian foreign Ministry to hear. Thus, Moscow seeks to further division within the Ukraine. According to a survey conducted by the Kyiv Razumkow-Institute support in the predominantly Russian-speaking Eastern Ukraine and in the South along the black sea and Asowküste just one in seven Ukrainians, the Church split. To ensure Moscow can build if it wants to destabilize the situation in Ukraine. In 2014, the language question in Ukraine has been exaggerated by the Kremlin in such a way that this resulted in the Donbass to the founding of two pro-Russian “people’s republics”.
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Bartholomew, the Orthodox Patriarch of the Ukrainian national Church recognises
Also, why is both the feast of St. Bartholomew as the new head of the Church, Metropolitan Epiphanius, in which the faithful are called to moderation and renunciation of violence have been called in. The respective congregations should be free to decide which of the Patriarchate – the new Kiev or Moscow – they wanted to make, it said. According to the new Ukrainian Metropolitan Epiphanius want to do this, around 7000 Church communities, which would be in about one in every second municipality of the Moscow Patriarchate. However, it is unclear whether this will accept the Moscow Patriarchate. In the Ukraine, wild rumors, about the Orthodox Priest of the Moscow Patriarchate from the Donbass area, for weeks, the Orthodox monasteries on the government would infiltrate the area are circulating, meanwhile, is already. Also valuable icons are to be to Russia are transported.
