Contrary to Tomos: UOC KP parishes in US declare their affiliation with OCU

A unanimous decision to remain within the OCU was taken at the parish meeting of the Holy Trinity Parish in Bridgeport city

On March 3, 2019, during the annual report-election parish meeting, the community of the Holy Trinity Parish of the Kiev Patriarchate in the city of Bridgeport, Connecticut, USA, made a unanimous decision to remain under the jurisdiction of the OCU, said the parish priest Oleksandr Dviniatin, on his Facebook page.

He added that during the divine service, members of his community plan to make a liturgical mention of the “OCU Primate, His Beatitude Metropolitan Epiphany and His Holiness Patriarch Philaret”.

“Regarding the overseas parishes of the OCU: Tomos is not a Symbol of Faith, take it as a Typicon,” said Dviniatin.

In the comments under the news about the decision of the Holy Trinity parish in Bridgeport, Oleksij Holchuk, the rector of the Holy Ascension Church of the UOC KP in the city of Clifton, New Jersey, also said that his community does not intend to move to the Patriarchate of Constantinople.

“The Holy Ascension Church of Clifton NJ is and will remain a part of the Ukrainian Church with its center in Kiev – the local Orthodox Church of Ukraine. This issue was settled by our parish many years ago. No one has the right to take away freedom from people including who should be considered their primate,” Holchuk wrote.

At the same time, head of the OCU Epiphany Dumenko said that the process of transferring foreign parishes to the UOC KP to Phanar is already underway. “It just may not be officially announced. We are negotiating that. It is impossible to do it at once. But now, for example, in Europe there are a lot of parishes that have expressed thier desire to be subordiante to the Ecumenical Patriarchate,” Epiphany said.

Recall, according to the provisions of the Tomos, being hyped by the adherents of the new religious organization as a document on “independence” and “autonomy” of the new Ukrainian “church”, the jurisdiction of the OCU is limited to the territory of Ukraine, whiles the new church structure no longer enjoys the right to ordain bishops or found parishes outside the state. "The already existing [parishes – Ed.] from now on are subordinate, according to the new order, to the Universal Throne, which has canonical powers in the Diaspora,” reads the text of the Tomos. It also states that all of the above terms (including the provision on re-subordination of foreign parishes of the Kiev Patriarchate to Phanar) are a necessary condition for the granting of Tomos as such: “On all these conditions, our Holy Great Church of Christ blesses and proclaims Autocephalous Orthodox Church in Ukraine.”

Earlier, Filaret said that there is a tendency to become dependent on Constantinople but his Church is ready to fight: “The tendency is that we can become dependent on Constantinople. Therefore, it depends on us whether we will obey them or not.”

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