Synod of the Hellas Church chooses not to recognize OCU

Session of the Holy Synod of the Orthodox Church of Greece

On January 8, 2019, a meeting of the Holy Synod of the Greek Orthodox Church was held, the participants of which did not recognize the OCU.

“The Holy Synod made a decision to transfer the consideration of the issue of recognition by the Hellas Church of the new Autocephalous Church in Ukraine to the Holy Council of the Hierarchy of the Hellas Church,” the members of the Synod informed in the communiqué.

It is not yet known when the meeting of the Council of Hierarchy will take place. The previous Council was convened on November 4, 2018.

The UOC DECR noted that the issue of recognition of the newly created church structure, which is to be addressed by the Hierarchy Council, indicates that the whole complexity of this problem is realized, and one of the reasons is that the head of the OCU, Epiphany Dumenko, has no canonical hierarchical ordination.

“It is worth paying attention to the fact that in the official report Epiphany is not called a metropolitan, while Bartholomew and Kirill are called patriarchs,” added the DECR.

Recall that the “honorary spiritual mentor” of the OCU, “patriarch” Filaret Denisenko, stated that sooner or later all the Local Churches will recognize the newly established church structure. “They are going to recognize it. But so far there are such Churches which, being under the influence of Moscow, do not want to recognize autocephaly of the Ukrainian Church. Nevertheless, I think and not only think but I am convinced that everyone will recognize it,” he said during the liturgy at St. Michael’s Cathedral.

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