UOC-MP May Lose Property, Legal Status If UOC-KP Gets Autocephaly - Metropolitan Hilarion

If the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Constantinople grants autocephaly to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kyiv Patriarchate (UOC-KP), the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate (UOC-MP) may be deprived of its property and legal status, Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk said on Tuesday.

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 18th September, 2018) If the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Constantinople grants autocephaly to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kyiv Patriarchate (UOC-KP), the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate (UOC-MP) may be deprived of its property and legal status, Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk said on Tuesday.

"There is nothing extraordinary about the fact that if autocephaly is granted to those who are schismatics now, then a real, full-scale war will be waged against the canonical church [UOC-MP] ... [If Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko's plans to create a unified local church are executed, then] related bills, aimed at depriving the canonical church of its property and legal status, will be adopted," Metropolitan Hilarion, chairman of the Department for External Church Relations of the Moscow Patriarchate, said, as broadcast by Russian Channel One.

He went on to say that there was the risk that Ukraine would face the same situation as it did over 25 yeas ago, when "the country was first religiously divided, and then this division was adopted to the civil society."

Hilarion said that only "God and common sense" could stop the religious and civil division of Ukraine.

He added that Constantinople, with its move to grant autocephaly to the UOC-KP, was breaching agreements that all Orthodox churches had reached.

"For many years, the Orthodox churches used to meet, to communicate, to elaborate certain positions and documents. In 1993, in particular, a common Orthodox stance was elaborated, stipulating that from now on, autocephaly, which means independence, cannot be given by one church to another. Granting autocephaly should be a pan-Orthodox process," Hilarion said.

Poroshenko is trying to achieve recognition of non-canonical church institutions and create a single local autocephalous church based on them in Ukraine.

In mid-September, the Constantinople Patriarchate appointed its exarchs to Ukraine as part of preparations to grant autocephaly to the UOC-KP, even though this was a breach of canonical rules. On Friday, the Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church decided that Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia would cut ties with Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople over the move, because the Russian Orthodox Church believed granting autocephaly to the UOC-KP threatened a schism in the Orthodox Church.