Archbishop
Job (Getcha) thinks that all Ukrainian bishops are de facto bishops
of the Patriarchate of Constantinople
11/02/2018 After
the recent abolition of the Act of 1686 by the Synod of the
Church of Constantinople about
transferring the Kiev Metropolis to Moscow, the Orthodox Church of
the Moscow Patriarchate in Ukraine no
longer exists. This was stated in an interview with the BBC by
Archbishop Job of Telmessos
(Getcha),
a representative of the Constantinople Patriarchate at the World
Council of Churches in Geneva. Coming from the Ukrainian
diaspora in Canada, Archbishop Job actively participates in the
processes taking place in the Orthodox Church in Ukraine.
The
archbishop found it difficult to name the specific dates for the
provision of autocephaly by the Patriarch Bartholomew of Thomos,
noting that the autocephalous Church in Ukraine "will surely
appear because this is the resolution of the Ecumenical Patriarchate"
"In
the Orthodox Church, the administration of the Church always
coincides with the administration of the state, the Zemstvo - it was
not I who invented and not Patriarch Bartholomew, it is said in the
17th rule of the Fourth Ecumenical Council," said Archbishop
Job. "In principle, when a new state appears, it may ask for an
autocephaly for its Church."
According
to the bishop, Constantinople took decisive steps right now for two
reasons: firstly, earlier he did not want to “take steps that could
stop or postpone the holding of the Holy and Great Cathedral in
Crete”; The second factor was the current foreign policy
situation around Ukraine. The archbishop claims that "there
are many Orthodox believers in Ukraine who ... do not want to have
ties with the Orthodox Church in Russia because of the conflict in
Donbas."
The
fact that the deputies of the Verkhovna Rada appealed to Fanar with a
request for autocephaly gives Archbishop Job the reason to declare
that this is the desire of the majority of the people: "In each
country, the parliament consists of deputies who are elected by the
people, so there is in every democracy. And every deputy is it is the
voice of its people. So, when the Verkhovna Rada appealed to the
Ecumenical Patriarchate with a majority of votes, this means that the
majority of the Ukrainian people appealed to the Ecumenical
Patriarchate to provide autocephaly. "
The
hierarch describes the actions of the Patriarchate of Constantinople
as altruistic and aimed at "saving millions of people." “If
the Ecumenical Patriarchate wanted to buy something, he could say: we
have the right to restore our metropolitan church that existed [in
Kiev] before the end of the 17th century,” he said. “But
Constantinople does not want this. Constantinople wants to donate to
Ukraine autocephaly so that Ukraine has its own Church. "
The
retaliatory measures taken by the Moscow
Patriarchate,
Archbishop Job, called "a reflex reaction of a certain
indignation" and expressed the hope that Moscow "will turn
to reason." However, the bishop of Constantinople warned,
"if such a situation persists for a long time, then of course,
the Ecumenical Throne as the First Throne of Ecumenical Orthodoxy
will be forced to take certain measures."
Answering
the correspondent’s question about how the local Orthodox Churches
reacted to information about the upcoming tribute to autocephaly in
Ukraine, Job of Telmessos said: “The reactions were very different.
They can be attributed to two categories: there were certain Churches
who said that the Ecumenical Patriarchate would decide and proclaim -
we must accept this. Others believed that since the Orthodox Church
in Ukraine had been under the administration of the Orthodox Church
in Russia for three hundred years, such a decision should be made in
coordination with the Orthodox Church. the Church in Russia. " He
also reported that some of the Church, initially supporting the
position of Constantinople, subsequently changed their position.
“It
is very important that the decision of the [Constantinople] Synod of
October 11 abolished the act of 1686,” Archbishop Job further
stated. “From a canonical point of view, this means that the Church
of the Moscow Patriarchate no longer exists in Ukraine. All bishops
in Ukraine are de facto according to the decision of this synod, they
are the bishops of the Ecumenical Throne, and now they must wait for
the directive of the Ecumenical Patriarchate regarding its further
functioning and existence in the perspective of granting autocephaly
to the Orthodox Church in Ukraine do not. " The bishop
does not know how much the bishops of the UOC-MP are aware of their
status, but he is confident that the Ecumenical Patriarch "will
inform them when he considers it necessary."
As
for the name of the new autocephaly, then, according to the
Archbishop of Telmessos, it will be called the "Orthodox Church
in Ukraine". “It will unite all Orthodox believers
residing on the territory of Ukraine, despite their origin,
nationality, citizenship. All Orthodox believers who are on the
territory of Ukraine will belong to the Orthodox Church in Ukraine,”
said the bishop, categorically opposing the name “Ukrainian
Orthodox Church ":" Not "Ukrainian Orthodox Church",
because the Church is one. It belongs to Christ, and not to any
nation or state. In Greek, the names of the Churches sound like
this: the Orthodox Church in Greece, Serbia or Bulgaria. Slavic
names - Bulgarian,
Archbishop
Job also said that he "observes and even experiences"
because "since the 19th century, the Protestant doctrine of the
Church had a very strong influence on the mentality of Russian
Orthodoxy ... Protestantism is just a group of separate churches, it
would be an exaggeration to even call it a confederation. And under
the influence of this doctrine, Moscow canonists of the 20th century
began to accuse Constantinople of Eastern papism. But these
accusations are unfounded, "the bishop believes.
Source:
https://drevo-info.ru/news/24241.html