Kiev Patriarchate declines to implement the Phanar’s decision on Filaret

Head of the UOC KP Filaret

The Kiev Patriarchate takes it slow to follow the decisions made at the meeting of the Synod of the Church of Constantinople on October 11, 2018.

According to the official communique of the Phanar, the hierarchs of the Church of Constantinople decided to canonically reinstate Filaret Denisenko and Makariy Maletich “to their hierarchical or priestly rank”. As theologian Andrei Kuraev explained, this means that Filaret was rehabilitated as a metropolitan.

At the same time, during the divine service in the Holy Vladimir Cathedral, the head of the UOC KP was commemorated as “patriarch”, while the name of Patriarch Bartholomew did not sound at all. In addition, a statement made by the press center of the UOC KP says that the Ecumenical Patriarchate restored the canonical recognition of "the episcopate and clergy of the Kiev Patriarchate" despite the fact that arising from the Phanar’s decisions, it should not recognize any ordinations performed by Filaret.

Earlier, speaking at the press conference on October 11, the head of the UOC KP said, "I was the patriarch, I am and I will be." Before the Phanar announced its decision to lift the anathema from the leaders of the UOC KP and the UAOC, Filaret had repeatedly stated that he intended to head the SLC.

As the UOJ reported, following the meeting of the Synod of the Church of Constantinople in Istanbul, a decision was made to re-establish the Stavropegion of the Constantinople Patriarchate in Kiev. The Phanar also revoked the "legal binding of the Synodal Letter of 1686, issued for the circumstances of that time, which granted the right through oikonomia to the Patriarch of Moscow to ordain the Metropolitan of Kiev."

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