ONLY FOUR BISHOPS RESPOND TO VLADYKA FILARET'S
INVITATION
Only four bishops arrived at the invitation of Honorary
Patriarch
Filaret for the celebration in honor of the holy martyr Makary
and for
"friendly conversation." This was reported by the BBC.
Of the more than 40 hierarchs of the former Ukrainian
Orthodox Church
of the Kiev Patriarchate (UPTsKP), journalists noted Archbishop
of Simferopol
and Crimea Kliment at the divine liturgy, and also a group of
hierarchs of the
Kiev patriarchate who come from Russia: Metropolitan of Belgorod
and Oboiansk
Ioasaf, his vicar bishop Petr, and Bishop Adrian.
Archbishop Kliment, the publication notes, arrived for
the celebration
out of respect for Filaret.
Not appearing was one of the most influential hierarchs
of the Orthodox
Church of Ukraine (PTsU), who at the unification council was the
main
competitor to Metropolitan Epifany for the primacy in the new
church, Metropolitan
of Lutsk and Volyn Mikhail, whom sources have called one of the
possible allies
of Honorary Patriarch Filaret.
Metropolitan Epifany also did not appear at the St.
Vladimir's
cathedral. On this day he has a planned visit in Mariupol.
During the liturgy, Vladyka Filaret commemorated
Metropolitan of Kiev
and all-Ukraine Epifany in the diptych of primates of the local
Orthodox
churches.
Yesterday, 13 May, the same bishops of the former UPTsKP
prayed in the
St. Vladimir's cathedral in an all-night vigil, which preceded
the liturgy. As
noted on her Facebook page by the journalist Yaroslava
Mishchenko, who attended
the divine liturgy, schism in the PTsU has not occurred.
"I once again congratulate Patriarch Filaret. He was
able to make
a freedom-loving church, for which we will be yet be thankful to
him in the
future. Although it will not be as it was in the past. There
cannot be
dual-power any longer. In the final analysis, it is dangerous,"
Mishchenko
wrote.
As RISU has already reported, Honorary Patriarch Filaret
summoned to
the St. Vladimir's cathedral the former clergy of the UPTsKP for
commemorating
the holy martyr Makary and for friendly conversation. Vladyka
Filaret sent the
invitation to the prayer on the letterhead of the Kiev
patriarchate to all
bishops except Metropolitan Epifany. After publicity in the news
media, he also
invited the primate of the PTsU, Epifany.
Honorary Patriarch Filaret previously criticized the
current charter of
the PTsU and declared that the Kiev patriarchate still exists. A
number of
observers called today's "friendly conversation" with the
hierarchs
in the Vladimir cathedral an attempt by Vladyka Filaret to
revive and to head
the UPTsKP and thereby split the PTsU. (tr. by PDS, posted 14
May 2019)
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