Romanian Church Synod announces several UOC communities' desire to "return"

Conference hall of the Romanian Patriarchate. Photo: Basilica

At a meeting of the Holy Synod of the Romanian Orthodox Church held on March 27, 2025, the Romanian Patriarchate expressed that some Romanian Orthodox communities of the UOC wish to join its jurisdiction, according to the Basilica news portal.

The Synod "took note with hope and blessing of the desire of some Romanian Orthodox communities in Ukraine to return to the Romanian Orthodox Church," the statement reads.

According to the Romanian outlet BucPress, this decision comes in response to recent appeals by Romanian UOC faithful and clergy from the Chernivtsi region, who expressed a desire to return under the Romanian Orthodox Church's jurisdiction. The publication reports that in August 2024, three UOC parishes convened a Founding Assembly of the Romanian Orthodox Church in Ukraine in Chernivtsi, in accordance with Ukrainian law. On August 28, 2024, they submitted the required documents to the State Service for Ethnopolitics and Freedom of Conscience (DESS) for the legal registration of the Romanian Orthodox Church in Ukraine. However, the Ukrainian authorities have not issued an official response, despite nearly seven months having passed since the application.

In October 2024, the Romanian Church expressed regret over the delay in legal recognition, emphasizing that the church meets all the conditions set out by Ukrainian legislation. At the same time, the Holy Synod approved continued appeals to the Romanian and Ukrainian authorities to resolve the matter.

On February 28, 2025, the initiative group for the registration of the Romanian Orthodox Church in Ukraine appealed directly to President Zelensky, requesting intervention to unblock the legal recognition process. In this context, Ciprian Olinici, Romania’s State Secretary for Religious Affairs, met with DESS head Viktor Yelensky.

Yelensky reportedly suggested establishing such a structure within the framework of the OCU. However, BucPress writes that the Romanian UOC parishes rejected this proposal.

According to a letter by Metropolitan Longin published on March 25, 2025, a meeting of a “small number” of Romanian-speaking clergy from the Chernivtsi–Bukovyna Eparchy of the UOC was recently held at the Church of the Ascension in Horyachyi Urban. Based on the context of the letter, these priests discussed transferring to the Romanian Patriarchate—a move for which Metropolitan Longin strongly criticized them.

"I was surprised that now, during the Great Lent, when we should be devoted to prayer and repentance, priests have chosen to switch to another Patriarchate and no longer belong to our canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church under the leadership of His Beatitude Metropolitan Onuphry," the hierarch wrote.

He called on the clergy to remain loyal to the UOC: "To be a patriot does not mean to betray your Church and the Lord! You have spat in the soul of our Primate, His Beatitude Onuphry, and wounded his heart with the knife of betrayal."

Metropolitan Longin also warned of the consequences of schism: "The grave sin of those who divide Christ’s Church cannot be washed away even by martyr’s blood. And our beautiful, faithful Bukovyna will never forgive you the grave sin of schism."

He added that the names of those who “tasked others with lighting the fire using someone else’s hands” are known and threatened to expose them if necessary.

According to UOJ sources, 26 UOC priests from Bukovyna, including some ethnic Ukrainians, had decided to join the Romanian Church, fearing their churches could be seized by the OCU. Following Metropolitan Longin’s appeal, 6 of them changed their decision.

As previously reported by the UOJ, the Ukrainian authorities had earlier refused to register the Romanian Patriarchate’s structure.

Read also