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Council of Bishops of the Serbian Orthodox Church decides not to recognize OCU

20.05.2019, 09:43
The official website of the Serbian Patriarchate issued a press release on the decisions of the Council of Bishops which took place from May 9 to 18.

The official website of the Serbian Patriarchate issued a press release on the decisions of the Council of Bishops which took place from May 9 to 18.

It announces that the Serbian Orthodox Church does not recognize the “parachurch entity" in Ukraine, considering it “a church split,” and regards the decision of the Ecumenical Patriarch to grant autocephaly as “an unsuccessful attempt to solve the problem unilaterally, ‘bending it across the knee’”, having held neither dialogue with the UOC Moscow Patriarchate and Russian Orthodox Church nor the Pan-Orthodox consultations.

In addition, the Council “complained” of other problems encountered by the Serbian Church – unequal struggle with the states for the preservation of Kosovo and Metohija, hostility and discrimination of the SOC in the countries of the former Yugoslavia, especially in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, North Macedonia and Montenegro in particular, non-canonical intrusion of the Romanian bishop and priest into the canonical territory of the SOC in eastern Serbia, growth of the number of different schismatics and sectarians, etc.

This decision of the Council of Bishops of the SOC was adopted on the background of the visit of Archbishop Chrysostomos of Cyprus to Belgrade, where he discussed with Patriarch Irineus the issue of recognition of the OCU. This is reported by Cerkvarium.