MP: Constantinople makes the proclaimed OCU its offshoot
The Patriarchate of Constantinople endowed the newly established church structure with rather a low status, depriving it of its independence, Vladimir Litvin believes.
Constantinople made the recently proclaimed OCU its own branch. This was stated by the former head of the Verkhovna Rada, MP Vladimir Litvin, in an interview with 112.ua channel.
“Please note that Patriarch Filaret did not announce the dissolution of the UOC KP and he will not do this,” the politician emphasized. “Given that the status granted by Constantinople to the proclaimed Church (OCU — note UOJ) is much smaller, Constantinople, which used to have no parishes, made it its branch, a subdivision, having suddenly received de facto tremendous opportunities and great influence. We will just see what religious buildings will fall into direct submission to Constantinople.”
Litvin also said that the wording of the recently adopted draft law No. 4128-d, which regulates the change of religious subordination, will allow the heads of RSAs to administratively reassign parishes in favor of the OCU.
Vladimir Litvin became one of the signatories of the appeal to the Constitutional Court of Ukraine with the demand to repeal Law No. 2662 (number of the registered bill No. 5309 – Ed. note) on renaming religious organizations, which the Verkhovna Rada adopted on December 20.
Earlier, Metropolitan Sofroniy of Cherkassy and Kanev stated that Constantinople had established a fully-controlled Greek church in Ukraine .
