UAOC Sobor looks ahead to unification efforts (10/01/00)

UAOC Sobor looks ahead to unification efforts

by Irene Jarosewich

PARSIPPANY, N.J. - The Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church (UAOC), one of three Orthodox Churches in Ukraine, on September 14-15 held its first Church Sobor since the death earlier this year of the head of the Church, Patriarch Dymytrii. The 647 delegates gathered in Kyiv at the Sobor chose Metropolitan Mefodii of Ternopil to continue in the main leadership role of the Church, a role he assumed after the death of the patriarch.

However, since there is an active movement under way in Ukraine to unite the Ukrainian Orthodox Churches, the Sobor purposefully chose not to elect another patriarch, instead opting to wait and see how unification efforts develop.

Present at the Sobor, held at the Palace of Arts and Culture, was a five-member delegation of Church hierarchs and lay representatives from the United States, headed by Metropolitan Constantine of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the U.S.A. According to Dr. Anatole Lysyj of Minneapolis, a lay member of the UOC-U.S.A. delegation, Metropolitan Constantine was asked by the hierarchs of the UAOC in Ukraine to preside over their Sobor, fulfilling, in part, the final request of the deceased Patriarch Dymytrii that Metropolitan Constantine and the UOC-U.S.A. provide spiritual leadership and guidance to the UAOC after his death.

The situation of the Orthodoxy in Ukraine is complex, with three Churches vying for the loyalty of Ukraine's tens of millions of Orthodox faithful. For centuries, the Russian Orthodox Church has considered that the Orthodox faithful of Ukraine belong to the Russian Church.

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union and Ukraine's independence in 1991, Ukrainian Orthodoxy has seen a strong movement away from Moscow, with the establishment of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Kyiv Patriarchate (UOC-KP), headed by Patriarch Filaret and the UAOC. Nonetheless, the patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church still considers the ROC's exarchate in Ukraine, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Moscow Patriarchate (UOC-MP), the third Orthodox Church in Ukraine, to be the only legitimate Orthodox Church there and considers the other two Churches to be illegitimate or "schismatic."

Rejecting the ROC's claim that it is and can be the only legitimate Orthodox Church in Ukraine, the UAOC seeks to become part of one unified and independent Orthodox Church in Ukraine and seeks recognition from the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople. Recognition from the ecumenical patriarch would give a unified Ukrainian Church legitimacy within the Orthodox world.

During the UAOC Sobor Metropolitan Constantine pledged to be a liaison with the ecumenical patriarch in Constantinople in these efforts. [The UOC-U.S.A. is part of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople.]

The delegates at the UAOC Sobor were informed that the Councils of Bishops of two of the three Orthodox Churches in Ukraine, the UAOC and the UOC-KP, had agreed to send a joint letter to Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople asking for his help in facilitating the establishment of a single independent Ukrainian Orthodox Church. The letter, signed by 33 bishops from both Churches, also invites the ecumenical patriarch to visit Ukraine.

According to Dr. Lysyj, "This process of unification and recognition has been going on for five years. We [the UOC-U.S.A.] gave the ecumenical patriarch historical, religious and political information to help inform him of the situation in Ukraine. ... We hope that a segment of the faithful who belong to the Moscow Patriarchate in Ukraine will also join [a unified, independent Ukrainian Orthodox Church], though we anticipate bitter resistance and much disinformation from the Russian Orthodox Church."

According to RFE/RL Newsline, Metropolitan Mefodii stated after the Sobor, "If there is a single autocephalous Ukrainian Orthodox Church, then Ukraine will leave Moscow's political orbit. If there is no such Church, what can be said about Ukraine's independence?"

Patriarch Filaret of the UOC-KP, who had been invited to visit several Orthodox parishes in the United States in late September, in a statement released September 16 canceled his scheduled U.S. visit, noting that the changes underway regarding the Orthodox Churches required his presence in Ukraine.

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