Synod of Bulgarian Church did not consider the issue of OCU recognition

The Patriarchal Cathedral of the Bulgarian Church of the Holy Apostle Alexander Nevsky in Sofia

On January 24, a meeting of the Synod of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church took place and many publications were quick to announce it was considering the “Ukrainian issue”, which nearly split the unity of the episcopate of the Bulgarian Church. However, such statements are refuted by the Bulgarian edition Glasove.

Glasove notes that seven bishops of the Bulgarian Church appealed to the Synod with a letter in which they declared the need to support the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church. However, this does not mean at all that other hierarchs, including Patriarch Neophyte, support the Ukrainian split.

“Despite insinuations in some mass media, neither the most holy Patriarch Neophyte, nor Metropolitan Joseph (Bosakov), who heads the Bulgarian Orthodox diocese in the USA, Canada and Australia, opposed the proposal of the seven bishops. In the end, there was no vote to include the Ukrainian case on the agenda,” reports the outlet.

The result of the discussion of the Ukrainian issue by the Bulgarian bishops was the decision to create a special commission headed by Metropolitan Cyprian (Kazandzhiev).

Recall, Metropolitan Cyprian arrived in 2018 in Kiev at the invitation of the UOC to the celebration of the Baptism of Rus. In an interview with the UOJ, the bishop, in particular, stated the following: “Church life should be based on church canons. This is the pillar of our Orthodox Churches. Anything outside this canonical foundation cannot be right and true.”

Read also