Phanar: Our ultimate goal is to restore unity with Catholics

Meeting of Patriarch Bartholomew and Pope Francis. Photo: pravoslavie.ru

Our ultimate goal is to restore unity with Catholics. The Exarch of Constantinople to Ukraine, Bishop Mikhail of Comana, spoke about this at the presentation of the Ukrainian translation of the documents to the Joint International Commission on Orthodox-Catholic dialogue, which took place in Kyiv on October 26.

“This is more than a wonderful publication, but it is only a tool serving the ultimate goal, the goal being the search for unity. Restoration of unity, pardon, not a search,” specified the Phanar exarch.

Earlier, the UOJ wrote that the Exarch of Constantinople to Ukraine considers the search for unity with Catholics important for the preservation of unity in Orthodoxy.

As a reminder, on October 26 in Kyiv, a conference of the UGCC, Phanar and OCU on the search for unity was held, during which the head of the UGCC voiced the goal of the ecumenical dialogue – the restoration of communion, the representative of the Vatican urged to make efforts so that the "success" of this dialogue would be implemented in Ukraine at a local level, while the Uniate priest said that Catholics and Orthodox Christians should elect "the future Ukrainian patriarch" together.

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