UOC hierarch: Pandemic prepares the Church for the end times

Archbishop Theodosius of Boyarka. Photo: vicariate.church.ua

God-sent calamity for World Orthodoxy in the form of coronavirus pandemic has two components: the problem of Hellenism in its negative vein and the preparation of the Church for entering the eschatological time. Archbishop Theodosius (Snigirev), the Vicar of the Kiev Metropolis told about this in an interview with the Pravoslavie.ru portal.

“In a number of cases, Hellenism began to malignantly regenerate the healthy tissue of the church life of the Greek world,” he explained. “With the hands of its radical adherents, it pushed World Orthodoxy to the brink of a split. Representatives of religious Hellenism – "Romance", as they call themselves – this, of course, is an incomparably small part of the Orthodox Church. But this is its historical part as Rome used to be. And its possible backslide will become a tragedy for the entire Orthodoxy no less than the events of 1054."

As a result, according to the hierarch, one gets the impression that "the Lord intervenes in the safe course of life in the Greek world, which has come up to the brink of falling away from the purity of the Fatherly faith."

“The Lord comes to help the Greeks to heal from the new heresy of Eastern papism, to prevent the split of Orthodoxy. This is God's visit, this is God's salvation. Therefore, it is small wonder that the relentlessness of the secular world, by God's providence, has now questioned the very right of the Greek Churches to perform liturgies in their churches or to celebrate Easter. The "secular world" whose favor Phanar and his followers have recently tried to win at the expense of Orthodox unity. <...> May God arrange it so that all this can be a good start to revising the causes that put the Ecumenical Orthodox Church on the brink of a split,” said Archbishop Theodosius.

According to the hierarch of the UOC, the main conclusion, which the rest, the greater part of the Orthodox community can now draw in light of today’s tribulation, is unpreparedness for such challenges of the present and an urgent need to rethink “the external forms of life of the Orthodox Church in the event of force majeure".

“Concerning Phanar, it’s also not so much about punishment as about admonition for correction. For Phanariots, this admonition is necessary to realize their destructive actions in relation to World Orthodoxy, while for the rest of the Orthodox world <...> this period of trials is more necessary for theological, canonical and liturgical preparations to enter the eschatological time,” Archbishop Theodosius explained.

As reported by the UOJ. Archbishop Theodosius of Boyarka called the coronavirus pandemic a “mini-flood” for us to take a new look at our life.

Read also