After months of negotiations, Ukraine’s Orthodox churches are about to unify officially and form a Ukrainian church independent of Russia, cutting religious ties dating from the 17th century.
The highest body in world Orthodoxy, the Istanbul-based Ecumenical Patriarchate of the Eastern Orthodox Church, announced on Nov. 19 that the Unification Council of the Orthodox churches of Ukraine would take place in December. The exact date is yet to be announced.
At the council, the representatives of Ukraine’s Orthodox churches will choose the patriarch of Kyiv. The newly-elected patriarch will receive from the Istanbul-based Orthodox authorities an official decree, called a “tomos,” granting the new church an autocephaly, or independence.
This will end the 359-year period of the Ukrainian church being subordinated to the Russian church, and instead move it into direct subordination of the central Orthodox authorities in Istanbul.
The Ecumenical Patriarchate also reiterated its decision to grant the autocephaly to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, as they prepare to hold council on Nov. 27-29.
Ukraine’s Orthodox church has been subordinated to Russia for centuries, while the Russian church in turn was subordinated to the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople (the former name of Istanbul). However, due to its size, the Moscow-based Russian Orthodox Church has wielded great influence in world Orthodoxy.
Ever since the Soviet Union broke up and Ukraine gained independence from Russia in 1991, many in Ukraine called for a break in church ties as well. Several top clergymen from the Moscow-subordinated Ukrainian church formed a breakaway independent church in the late 1990s.
The independent church grew much stronger after Russia started the war against Ukraine in 2014, invading Crimea and Donbas, but only now has official recognition in the world community of Orthodox churches been granted. The former breakaway church based in Kyiv will form the basis of the new unified independent church.
However, the leaders of the Moscow-subordinated Ukrainian church oppose unification and say they will not join the new independent church, and will cut all ties with the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Istanbul. The Moscow-subordinated church controls more than half of the existing churches in Ukraine.
The Ecumenical Patriarchate announced in October it would grant independence from Russia to the Ukrainian church, and withdrew its excommunication of the head of the breakaway Ukrainian church, Patriarch Filaret.
