Serbian hierarch calls to hold the Pan-Orthodox Council on autocephaly

Bishop of the Serbian Orthodox Church, Metropolitan Amphilochius (Radović) of Montenegro and the Littoral

According to the Serbian bishop, Local Churches should hold a Pan-Orthodox Council to make a final decision who can give autocephaly, reports TASS.

The Metropolitan noted that “Constantinople no longer has the rights that he once had to grant autocephaly unilaterally”, and he sees the continuation of the work of the Crete Council, which was held without the participation of four Local Churches and therefore was not pan-Orthodox, to be the only way to solve the Ukrainian question.

“The Serbian Patriarch called to continue it [the Crete Council, - Ed.],” the hierarch said. “The four Patriarchies must give their decision on the Council, since without the participation of the Russian Orthodox Church and the other three, it cannot be pan-Orthodox. It is necessary to adopt decisions of the Council <...> and at the same time raise at the Council the topic of granting autocephaly. The Council must make a final decision on who can give autocephaly, and thereby resolve the question of Ukraine and other similar phenomena. ”

Metropolitan Amphilochius is convinced that within the framework of this Council it is quite possible to revise the decisions of the Patriarchate of Constantinople on Ukraine. He also recalled that the issue of the rules for granting autocephaly was prepared for the Crete Council, but Constantinople refused it at the last moment.

“If the Patriarch of Constantinople accepts what he already signed in Geneva in 2009 that only the Mother Church can grant autocephaly, then he should accept that only the Moscow Patriarchate, to which Kiev has belongs for 300 years, has the right, if it considers it necessary, to grant autocephaly to the Ukrainian Church, ” underlined the bishop. “But the Russian Orthodox Church has to suggest this, and the rest of the Churches will consider and accept it.” If the schismatics in Ukraine repent, the Moscow Patriarchate can remove the anathema for the sake of the normal functioning of the Church.”

According to the Serbian hierarch, the earlier the Pan-Orthodox Council is convened, the better.

“We will discuss this on November 6 at our Council of Bishops and I think that this will be the proposal of the COC – to continue the Crete Council, as well as to raise at it the issues of granting autocephaly and the issue of the diaspora. The Patriarchate of Constantinople insists that the diaspora belongs to him, and this is absolutely unacceptable from the point of view of the canons,” said the Metropolitan of Montenegro and the Littoral.

We recall the Council in Crete was held on June 20-26, 2016. The preparation for it was carried out for 55 years and it was planned as Pan-Orthodox, however, four of the 14 Local Churches (Bulgarian, Antioch, Georgian and Russian) refused to participate in it because of disagreement with the regulations and texts of the adopted documents.

As the UOJ reported, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia, stated that all-Orthodox councils should be convened “not once in a hundred years, but regularly”: “Then we could really discuss in a conciliar way the problems that arise.”

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