We can’t fail to engage in talks of Phanar on Tomos, – ROC hierarch

Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople and Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk, Chairman of the Department for External Church Relations of the Moscow Patriarchate

The initiative on granting the Tomos on autocephaly to the Church in Ukraine has shaken the entire Orthodox world, believes Chairman of the Department for External Church Relations of the Moscow Patriarchate Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk. He said this on July 7 in an interview to ”TASS”.

"We will not simply watch the events develop, we will participate in this development of events. We hope that common sense will prevail, because the Ukrainian Church, which is already subjected to persecution and pressure so that it will break all its ties with the Moscow Patriarchate, did not ask for autocephaly," the bishop said.

In mid-April, Poroshenko turned to Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople with a request to grant Tomos on autocephaly to the Church in Ukraine and announced the creation of a Single Local Church. The Verkhovna Rada supported the petition of the President. The Kyiv Patriarchate has already stated they see their leader Filaret, anathematized by the canonical Church, as a head of the SLC.

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