"Speaking about schisms,
still one of the most painful schisms has been and remains the schism in the
Ukrainian Orthodoxy. The Ukrainian Orthodox
Church under the rule of His Beatitude Metropolitan Volodymyr is the most
massed and the only canonical Orthodox Church in the territory of Ukraine. It has to perform its ministry in the most difficult conditions of the opposition on the part of schismatic groupings, supported by
the nationally oriented political circles - the so-called "Kyiv Patriarchate"
and the "Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church".
The latter makes active
attempts to find support on the part of the Constantinople Patriarchate. In order to avoid danger of confrontation between
the two Patriarchates on the Ukrainian issue, we set to negotiations with the
Constantinople Patriarchate, hoping to find the right solution that will make
for overcoming schisms and consolidation of the Ukrainian Orthodoxy, through
the cooperation of the two churches and with the support of all the Orthodox
Fullness. The prominent event in the Ukrainian Orthodoxy was the latest Council of the hierarchs of
the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, held on July, 28 of present year in the
Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra.
The Council evidenced the canonical
unity of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church with its Mother - the Russian Orthodox
Church which granted it independence and self-government by the Act of the
Sacred Council of Bishops of 1990. The Kyiv
Council called all the Orthodox believers of Ukraine to stop the inter-confessional
confrontation and to set about the counciliar consideration of the issue of the
further canonical status of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church only after the
canonical healing of schism.
I find it
advisable and timely to support the position of the eminent hierarchs of the
Ukrainian Orthodox Church, expressed at the Kyiv Council and to render every
assistance possible for overcoming the schism and consolidation of the
Orthodoxy in Ukraine. We have to discuss the situation in Ukraine and to take corresponding
steps." | | |
