Bulgarian political expert: Autocephaly of OCU is a geo-religious project

Vasilianna Merheb and presenter of the TV program Yavor Dachkov. Photo: YouTube video screenshot

Believer of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church, political scientist Vasilianna Merheb, said that receiving the Tomos and recognizing autocephaly of the OCU is a geo-religious special operation, in which representatives of schismatic structures are involved. This was reported by the "Analytical Center of St. Basil the Great" with reference to an interview with the political analyst with "Bulgarian Free Television".

According to Vasilianna Merheb, the OCU appears an artificial formation that enjoys the protection of the authorities and politicians, who in their personal plane have nothing to do with Orthodoxy, with the Church, "like Greek-Catholics Parubiy and Petro Poroshenko who profess some kind of multi-confessionality."

“Since we are talking about the man who came to power as a result of the coup, he tried to apply the same scheme in the Church,” said the political analyst. “But whom is their coup aimed at – Jesus Christ Himself?” It's impossible. They forget that the Church is a divine-human organism. It is impossible to defeat God's Church by any force whatever it may be. What are they saying? "We have to cut the umbilical cord with Russia." The only thing in this case is that the umbilical cord is not discussed with Russia, but with the gracious Church, which received apostolic succession and, by consistent ordinations, this gracious succession was preserved. If you imagine a Church with successive hierarchy in the form of a tree, you can see when suddenly an ugly outlier appears next to it that has nothing to do with a living trunk.”

Merheb recalled that the people of Ukraine did not declare their desire to have autocephaly because the Ukrainian Orthodox Church has complete autonomy in its administration.

“Whereas this schismatic structure received no independence, about which even Filaret speaks, Constantinople enslaved it. It is no coincidence that a new split has appeared within this structure – a split in the split. In my opinion, the main question is that truly faithful people, who are led by the true archpastors of Ukraine, did not ask for autocephaly. ‘Autocephaly’ is a political project and its makers are located outside Ukraine,” the political expert emphasized.

According to her, there have been no cases in history when autocephaly was given to schismatics, and therefore the silence of the Local Churches is unacceptable: “I think it is time for representatives of the local Churches to get together and come up with their evaluation of this phenomenon. Because in silence we allow for such lawlessness – an unprecedented political interference from across the ocean."

As reported by the UOJ, political expert Ruslan Biziayev believes that the Patriarchate of Constantinople has granted the OCU the narrowest metropolis status but not the autocephaly everyone is ranting about.

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