Ex-CC judge: When we attend OCU churches, we finance Patriarch Bartholomew

Viktor Shyshkin. Photo: I-UA TV channel

Retired Constitutional Court judge Viktor Shyshkin explained his view of how church hierarchy functions in the Ukrainian context. According to him, parishioners of any Orthodox church ultimately support the higher ecclesiastical authority to which that church is subordinate.

“One simply needs to understand how church hierarchy works: all local churches pass part of their donations to the higher hierarchy. When we attend the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, we finance the Patriarch of Constantinople because the OCU is subordinate to him,” Shyshkin said during the Government Purge program.

The former judge drew a direct parallel with UOC parishes:

“Similarly, if the Moscow Patriarchate in Ukraine is subordinate to Moscow, then of course they transfer money there. In exactly the same way that Catholic churches send money to the Pope, because they belong to the Catholic Church. What is so difficult to understand here? It is elementary logic.”

According to Shyshkin, parishioners should know under which patriarchate their church falls, since Orthodox churches cannot exist outside a patriarchate.

“If a church is outside a patriarchate, it is not a church,” he asserted.

As previously reported by the UOJ, according to Shostatsky, the UOC does not send money to Moscow.

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