Posted on 10/26/2018 6:05:42 PM PDT by marshmallow
The Patriarch dismisses arguments against his unilateral actions as “black propaganda”
Finally responding to the pushback against his Patriarchate’s unilateral actions in Ukraine, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew has insisted that he will not back down in Ukraine, meaning he will continue to work towards creating an autocephalous Church in Ukraine, although the nation is already the canonical territory of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church under the headship of His Beatitude Metropolitan Onuphry of Kiev and All Ukraine.
Speaking at a meeting of the city government of the Greek diaspora in Constantinople, Pat. Bartholomew argued that his actions are based on the sacred canons of the holy Orthodox Church and are binding on the entire Church, reports orthodoxia.info.
To date, no other Local Orthodox Church that has spoken on the matter has supported Constantinople’s interpretation of the canons and its rights to act unilaterally within another Local Church.
He also said that the Russian Church would eventually have to submit and obey his decisions: “Whether our Russian brothers like it or not, sooner or later, they will follow the decisions of the Ecumenical Patriarch, because they have no other choice.”
Rather than addressing the in-depth historical and canonical arguments being put forth by Orthodox Synods, primates, and hierarchs around the world, Pat. Bartholomew instead said he is aware of Russian “black propaganda” and “well-paid articles.” He did not mention how much he believes the Russian Orthodox Church is paying other Patriarchates to voice their views.
(Excerpt) Read more at orthochristian.com ...
Once the Russian Orthodox Church has new leadership, it’s not only the church that will change, but Russian society also. No more putin’ up with all this Putin nonsense. (Pun intended.) No more Soviet throwbacks.
The Orthodox Church appears to be moving towards consensus in favor of a pan Orthodox Synaxis to resolve this issue, which is what should have been done in the first place. The Bulgarians have just announced a special meeting of their Holy Synod to address the request of Patriarch Kyrill’s appeal to that effect. I don’t think this is going to end well for Bart.
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