UOC Spokesman: Bishop of Sumperk has no blessing to serve with OCU

Bishop Isaiah in St. Michael’s Monastery. Photo: Facebook

The con-celebration of the hierarch of the Orthodox Church of the Czech Lands and Slovakia (hereinafter as OCCLS), Bishop Isaiah (Slaninka) of Sumperk will be interpreted as the beginning of the recognition of the OCU but this is not true, noted Archpriest Nikolai Danilevich, Deputy Head of the Department for External Church Relations of the UOC.

“Bishop Isaiah showed up today with the schismatics of the OCU and served with them and, most likely, he will serve with them tomorrow. Undoubtedly, this fact will be hyped as the beginning of the recognition of the OCU by the OCCLS. However, this is not so,” the spokesman of the UOC commented on the actions of the Czech bishop on Facebook.

He emphasized that the presence of Bishop Isaiah at the service of the new church structure is an arbitrary act.

“As it became known from the OCCLS, this is the arbitrariness of Bishop Isaiah who does not have the blessing of his Primate and acts contrary to his Church, which in the person of its Primate, His Beatitude Metropolitan Rostislav, condemned the actions of Phanar and declared its non-recognition of the so-called ‘OCU’ (see statements by His Beatitude Metropolitan Rostislav of October 11, 2018 and February 3, 02019),” Archpriest Nikolai explained.

It is assumed that the clergy of the Orthodox Church of the Czech Lands and Slovakia in the near future will evaluate such actions of their hierarch, the deputy head of the UOC DECR added.

The clergyman also recalled that it was with the help of Bishop Isaiah that Phanar now “actually lays the foundation for creating a parallel jurisdiction in the OCCLS”. The Patriarchate of Constantinople registered a “stavropegial monastery” in the Czech Republic, which can admit clergymen of any jurisdictions, primarily from the Orthodox Church of the Czech Lands and Slovakia.

According to Archpriest Nikolai, this "stavropegial monastery" was led by the Bishop of the Patriarchate of Constantinople, Metropolitan Arseny (Kardamakis) of Austria, whose deputy is Bishop Isaiah.

“Here we are with a ‘Trojan (Phanarian) horse’ in the Orthodox Church of the Czech Lands and Slovakia. It is known he has long been sympathetic to our schismatics and, being an archimandrite, met with Filaret even before all the tomos stories,” said the spokesman of the UOC.

Recall, on November 20, 2019, in the St. Michael’s Monastery in Kiev, Bishop Isaiah (Slaninka) concelebrated with the head of the OCU, Epiphany Dumenko, and the “hierarchy” of this church structure.

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