Bulgarian hierarch: Phanar has no more rights than any other Church
The BOC bishop recalled that in 2017 the “Holy Synod” of the Church of North Macedonia declared that it recognizes the Bulgarian Patriarchate as the Mother Church.
Metropolitan Gabriel of Lovech of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church said that the Patriarchate of Constantinople has no more rights than any other Church, according to the ekklisiaonline.gr website.
Commenting on the acceptance of the Macedonians into Eucharistic communion by Phanar, Metropolitan Gabriel noted that "the Church of North Macedonia has been under the jurisdiction of Serbia since the 1920s, which is recognized by all the Orthodox Churches of the world."
“Therefore, according to the canons, the Serbian Orthodox Church had the right to grant autocephaly to the Church of North Macedonia” or to grant this right to the Pan-Orthodox Council.
In this regard, Vladyka emphasized that "the Ecumenical Patriarchate has no more rights than any other Orthodox Church."
In addition, Metropolitan Gabriel believes that “the Church of North Macedonia cannot be given the name of the Ohrid Archdiocese, since this is the historical name of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church from 1018 to 1767” and recalls that recently, viz. “in 2017, the Holy Synod of the Church of North Macedonia declared that it recognizes the Bulgarian Patriarchate as the Mother Church.”
Earlier, the UOJ wrote that, according to Metropolitan Gabriel of Lovech, the recognition of the Macedonians is further deepening of the schism in Orthodoxy.
