Why Ukraine needs a free and recognized Orthodox Church. Cyril Hovorun

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Not sure about ‘imminent’ but it’s an excellent article.

We can all hope and pray that the UOC is granted autocephaly
 
But which Ukranian Orthodox Church? That’s the issue . . .

The historical UOC entered communion with Rome with the Treaty of Brest, although it took about a century for all of the bishops to do so.

Then during soviet occupation after WWII, the Ukrainian bishops were imprisoned, some priests rounded up, and the false “Synod” of Lyiv–again, no Ukranian bishops present, just KGB and ROC bishops and Ukrainian priests–purported to agree that the Ukrainian Church was subject to moscow (Moscow claims to be the relocated see of Kiev from when the ruling family fled from Kiev to Muscovy. I don’t think those left behind agreed . . .). The churches were given to this new creation (now the UOC-MP) and the faithful had to go underground (Today’s Ukranian Catholic Church).

But unallocated/new territory is under the province of the Ecumenical Patriarch (of Constantinople), who raised the UOC-EP.

And for good measure, with Moscow and Constantinople struggling, The Ukrainian Autonomous Church, Orthodox but not in communion with any of the canonical Orthodox churches, AFAIK.

Moscow and Constantinople have broken communion with each other at least once over the Ukrainian situation, I believe (and have similar dispute in Estonia).

hawk
 
It’s a very interesting situation 🙂

I’ll be interested to see how it all plays out
 
I’m not sure I’ll live that long . . . I’ve only got about four active decades left, and maybe one more after that . . .

OTOH, if the four churches can not only come to terms (fairly easy) but also get Moscow to go along, the EP (and remainder of canonical Orthodoxy) and Pope will almost certainly go along, and ewe may have a bridge . . .

hawk
 
Full remarks by Andrii Krawchuk on “Initiative for Orthodox Autocephaly in Ukraine”, Sudbury, Ontario, Canada, 7 May 2018. Prof. Andrii Krawchuk teaches at the Department of Religious Studies, University of Sudbury.
  • 1:05 Misleading headlines are more sensational than accurate, e.g Ukraine’s Orthodox Church could become independent from Russia, Parliament of Ukraine approves initiative to split the Orthodox Church from Russia. Clarification: The autocephaly we are speaking about is not the same autocephaly discussed since Ukraine’s independence, i.e. the autocephaly of the UOC-MP
  • 1:50 Patriarch Filaret and the creation of a separate jurisdiction Ukrainian Orthodox Church Kyiv Patriarchate
  • 2:10 Debate on Autocephaly and whether it should be pursued
  • 2:44 Since the 1990s the Russian Orthodox Church has considered the Ukrainian Orthodox Church Kyiv Patriarchate uncanonical and schismatic. This has resulted in a socio-political anomaly in Ukraine
  • 3:47 When Russia invaded Ukraine, loyalty to an aggressor state is generally perceived as treason
  • 4:16 Petro Poroshenko is taking the lead in this new initiative. Poroshenko is not working with the autocephalous issue of the UOC-MP, but with UOC-KP which has an initiative to unite with the remains of the Autocephalous Orthodox Church and to request Patriarch Bartholemew recognize the [new] church as autocephalous and recognized as fully canonical
  • 5:08 Strenuously resisted by the Russian Orthodox Church
  • 5:40 Three possible scenarios:
    (a) This initiative leads no where, nothing comes of it. Bartholemew may have some hesitations
    (b) Moscow could see a race with Bartholemew and may grant autocephaly before Constantinople to neutralize the situation
    (c) Initiative will succeed and leave the UOC-MP on shakier ground morally. Increasing parishes of the UOC-MP have transferred to the UOC-KP. More bishops and eparchies could bolt as well
  • 9:46 Poroshenko stated that the successful completion of this initiative will not create a privileged state church. It would not be the official church of the Ukrainian state
  • 10:50 A test on Poroshenko’s resolve to maintain equality of religious beliefs, maintain European standards of equality
  • 11:40 Greek Catholics was lost to the Orthodox Church. Any further disintegration would need to be very carefully managed to avoid provocations by hyper-patriots. We don’t need to provoke Putin
  • 12:39 Big picture. Insightful remarks by Fr. Cyril Hovorun
  • 13:30 The Neo-Soviet neo-empire exploits its own autocephaly to expand its own power and to limit the power of Ukraine
  • 14:12 Like other countries, Ukraine pursues autocephaly as a means to leave the neo-empire
  • 14:47 Overall, in the long term, this is a move in the right direction, where peace becomes possible.
 
  • 15:33 It is important that the churches and religious communities should not be instrumentalized to perpetuate conflict or undermine normalization of relations with neighours. Stand above artificially created conflicts
  • 16:13 Online comments regarding Poroshenko’s political calculations
  • 17:17 Orthodox bishops in the diaspora came out in support
  • 17:57 Important to remember the rights of non-Orthodox citizens of Ukraine, other Christians, Protestants, Catholics, people of other faiths, or of no faith. Ukraine should continue to respect diversity of perspectives.
  • 18:35 A tendency to simplify history, news from Poland, or to reduce history to Kyivan Christianity for Ukrainians only, or for Orthodox only. The fact is in 988 AD everybody was equally Catholic and Orthodox. There was no split between East and West
 
For more on Orthodox Autocephaly in Ukraine, see:

Articles by Paul Brusanowski and Alfons Brüning
in Churches in the Ukrainian Crisis,
Krawchuk and Bremer, eds.
(New York: Palgrave, 2016).

Cyril Hovorun, “Autocephaly and its Ukrainian Case,”
Linkedin (April 21, 2018).

This video was not sponsored

Video by UkeTube

Religious Information Service of Ukraine RISU in English

 
Interview to Toronto-based UkeTube on the imminent Ukrainian autocephaly, in English:
  • 0:35 Government and Church in Ukraine worked together to facilitate a rapproachmentbetween the Orthodox Churches in Ukraine
  • 1:15 Story of reconciliation with Ukrainian Orthodox is over one hundred years old
  • 1:35 Begins with the independence of the Ukrainian State (Українська Держава) in 1918. The Ukrainian state facilitated the process of autocephalization of the Ukrainian church. It failed when the state fell to Communist Russia
  • 2:55 When Ukraine became independent again, part of Ukrainian Orthodoxy proclaimed itself autocephalous, part remained in union with Moscow Patriarchate
  • 4:15 Rhetoric, hostility between the three Ukrainian Orthodox Churches
  • 4:25 Russia uses the Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Moscow Patriarchate against Ukraine
  • 4:59 Failed attempt to gain independence from Patriarch Bartholemew initiated by Viktor Yushchenko
  • 5:57 Difference between attempts in 2008 compared to 2018
  • 7:40 President Viktor Yushchenko envisaged a single local Church in Ukraine; Idea of locality, i.e. one state with one church
  • 8:25 President Poroshenko hesitated for a long time to act. He was urged, encouraged many times by many players in Ukraine to address the church issue. Poroshenko postponed and missed many opportunities, likely because of political considerations
  • 9:55 Initiatives came from parishioners of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Moscow Patriarchate. Churches played a protagonist role. They urged Poroshenko to act
  • 10:37 Model does not presuppose one local church for Ukraine, but rather multiple jurisdictions, diverse Ukrainian Orthodoxy. Poroshenko clearly states he does not want to united all Orthodox Christians into one church
  • 11:45 Not about establishing a single local church for Ukraine. But rather the creation of a canonical alternative to the canonical UOC-MP, i.e. two canonical jurisdictions in Ukraine
  • 12:50 Members of the UOC-MP understand the role the Russian church played against Ukraine. Policy of keeping a blind eye on the war in the east discourages people to stay, but they don’t have an alternative
  • 14:15 This model is more viable, will keep the church self-sufficient not dependent on the state
  • 15:00 For some church goers canonicity is an issue, for others it is not
  • 16:05 Church of Kyivan Rus’ was incorporated into the Patriarchate of Constantinopol and enjoyed canonical status since 988 AD. This remained for centuries
  • 16:45 Destruction of Kyiv by Mongol hordes, the church was fragmented, split into two pieces. Church was “cloned”. One stayed in Ukraine and incorporated into the Lithuanian-Polish state, the other moved to Muscovy
 
  • 18:50 After the declaration of the Ukrainian People’s Republic, part of the church fled with those escaping Communist Soviet Union to the United States and Canada. That part of the Ukrainian church remained mostly outside communion with other churches. Only recently incorporated in the 1990s
  • 20:00 Patriarchate of Kyiv seeks recognition from Ecumenical Patriarchate
  • 20:25 Moscow Patriarchate in Ukraine accused Patriarchate of Kyiv of being non-canonical. Used non-canonical status to blame people, develop hatred, hate speech, narratives of rejection and exclusion on the grounds of canonicity. Eventually, it affects us
  • 21:57 The idea of Global Orthodoxy, a global family of churches, is not very important for the Moscow Patriarchate in Ukraine. They use ‘unity’ as a argument against Kyiv Patriarchate
 
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I see generally a problem withdefending uprising nationals in any orthodox church with autocephaly, because the result is often - uprising nationalism. I can imagine the future (new or reformed) ukrainian orthodox church you think of (because the “old” one is not in communion with the other churches) would with a high possibility become that national and influenced by politics as most here see the russian church was.
In germany, during the russian soviet era a new russian orthodox church independent of russia formed, and after the soviet´s fall, they wouldn´t come back under the moscovite patriarch´s authority. When I first checked out the orthodox churches here, I thought they would be more international and less “russian” as they were formed in the diaspora. The opposite was true. They hold often a strong russian nationalistic pride and teach the faith as a russian discipline - not very universal, even if, what I want to make clear, is not the case for all of them (there´s a lovely convent with right believing nuns, for example which is run by them). In short, they stopped the dialog finally and they felt out of communion with russian church of moscow because they founded new episcopates in already orthodox territory, and this is clearly a danger of schism.
 
This is a big reason why I support the OCA here in America. All the Orthodox jurisdictions should unite under this and just maintain their own unique cultural traditions (Greek or Slavic or Anitiochian etc). This is similar to how the Latin Church works over here…there are loads of “cultural” parishes (Hispanic, Burmese etc). So far it seems to work out well for them.

I also support the establishment of a Byzantine Catholic Church of America (one that basically combines all the existing overlapping jurisdictions of multiple bishops…Ukrainian, Ruthenian, Melkite, etc)
 
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and if you want to go really wild, a single jurisdiction with both orthodox and EC of various ritual; . . . won’t happen, but just thinking of the stomach acid that would;d flow in various quarters . . .

As for your first suggestion: OCA would have to be fully autonomous first; noone would willingly enter even indirect NP jurisdiction . . .

hawk
 
dochawk said:
and if you want to go really wild, a single jurisdiction with both orthodox and EC of various ritual; . . . won’t happen, but just thinking of the stomach acid that would;d flow in various quarters . . .
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lol, yes I think it would cause quite the uproar!
dochawk said:
As for your first suggestion: OCA would have to be fully autonomous first; noone would willingly enter even indirect NP jurisdiction . . .
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I think also that part of the problem is that the diaspora supports the homeland churches financially. If they were to be autonomous (and ideally autocephalous as well) then that cuts off a HUGE chunk of money to the various Churches. The same could be said for a united Byzantine Catholic Church…the diaspora supports the homeland again. Money money money… 😦
 
Angel_Gabriel said:
I think also that part of the problem is that the diaspora supports the homeland churches financially. If they were to be autonomous (and ideally autocephalous as well)
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Autonomy would imply autocephalous . . .
Angel_Gabriel said:
then that cuts off a HUGE chunk of money to the various Churches. The same could be said for a united Byzantine Catholic Church…the diaspora supports the homeland again. Money money money… 😦
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That’s an issue, but it would be far worse without autonomy–it would be dependent upon however the mother church. For the OCA, this would be the ROC.

With the unified American jurisdiction, the parishes could retain relations with their cultural churches and send support.

hawk
 
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New article in a Greek historical magazine about the Greek Church autocephaly from Constantinople.(I found these reflections on social page of Cyril Hovorun)
A few interesting points about this autocephaly:
  • Was purchased during the hybrid of the war with Turkey after the victory of the liberation revolution.
  • One of the motives was to limit the political influence of Russia on Greece.
  • Coincided with the reorientation of Greece with Eurasia to Europe.
  • It was initiated by the Greek national taxes (in the form of Parliament).
  • The last before the announcement of the decision of Parliament on this issue was made at the suggestion of the Secretary of the national security Council.
  • That the proclamation was a political decree of king Otto, a Catholic from Bavaria.
  • Theoretical foundations of Greek autocephaly was prepared by one Archimandrite, Feoklitis.
    Greek autocephaly was first aroused by whipping dishes in the Patriarchate of Constantinople, separation, and so on…but in the end the two Churches became very good friends.
 
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A valuable historical document
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In reality, really too hard to make any forecasts for the near future.
Unfortunately, the influence of Muscovite in Ukraine is quite huge.
Even in Western Ukraine, in some regions more Churches belong to the Moscow Patriarchate.
The same with monasteries, even on the territory of military hospitals the Churches of the Moscow Patriarchate.
I can’t imagine if to the Church comes the soldiers of the Ukrainian army from the war zone and asks for blessings or the preastly advice, does the preast always gives him the “right” advice?
In rural Orthodoxy of the Moscow Patriarchate in general there are eschatological sentiments. The priests are against biometric passports, interpreting the integration with EU as the countries apostasy from Orthodoxy and as approximating the Antichrist, etc.
In addition, many lay people honour the russian elders and revered Russian saints.
In Church ecclesiology in Ukraine reforms are needed urgent and radical.
The fact that reforms can be explosive dangerous and fatal for some regions is also true, therefore, they need to be taken with wisdom.
 
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