UOC Primate: Kharkov Council reaffirmed the unity of UOC with Ecumenical Orthodoxy

In May 2017 the Ukrainian Orthodox Church with a special uplift feeling celebrates the 25th anniversary of Kharkov Bishop Council of 1992, notes in his Address His Beatitude Metropolitan of Kiev and All Ukraine Onuphry, writes the UOC Information and Education Department.

The Primate congratulated Metropolitan of Kharkov and Bogodukhov Onufry, organizers and participants of the scientific and practical conference dedicated to an outstanding event in the Church life.

“The Council of Bishops held in the city of Kharkov on 27-28 May 1992 is a historic milestone in the contemporary history of our Church. It was a sacred event to become a turning point in a new social and political ambience of the Ukrainian statehood.

This Council was courageous standing for the Holy Orthodoxy and Church unity. Its activity was a result of the responsible and sensible decision of the episcopate who rose to the occasion and demonstrated a real pastoral care about the future of the Holy Ukrainian Church facing a complicated crossover moment.

In hard circumstances, prayerfully invoking grace of the Holy Spirit, members of the Council by secret ballot elected the son of the Ukrainian land, Metropolitan Vladimir (Sabodan), Primate of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. The decision of the Council was acclaimed by the Orthodox people who saw in his person the beginning of a new era of religious freedom in Ukraine.

With particular gratitude and respect, we remember the name of blessed memory of Metropolitan of Kharkov and Bogodukhov Nikodim (Rusnak). He is a role model of fidelity to the canonical principles of the Church, which inspires bishops, priests, monks and laymen to be faithful to the canonical Church, not to find compromises with conscience before challenges of this world.

The Council reaffirmed the unity of the nation with the Ecumenical Orthodoxy, defended the principles of the Church catholicity and created a rockbed for the Church to pursue its salutary mission across Ukraine.

Looking back at the last quarter of the century in the Church being, we can see that this challenging historic period called for the decisions that would largely influence further destiny of not only the Ukrainian Church but also the Ukrainian State. One can say this relatively short time frame determined the destiny of Orthodoxy in Ukraine for forthcoming decades,” the Address says.

Full text of the Address can be found on the site of the UOC Information and Education Department.