The Ecumenical Patriarchate of the Eastern Orthodox Church, or the Constantinople Patriarchate, based in Istanbul, has appointed official representatives in Ukraine, reads a statement posted on its Facebook page on Sept. 7.
“Within the framework of the preparations for the granting of autocephaly to the Orthodox Church in Ukraine, the Ecumenical Patriarchate has appointed His Excellency Archbishop Daniel of Pamphilon from the United States, and His Grace Bishop Ilarion of Edmonton from Canada as its Exarchs in Kyiv,” reads the message published by the Chief Secretariat of the Holy and Sacred Synod on Sept. 7.
The move is the next step to granting the Ukrainian Orthodox Church independence from Moscow, and prompted a rapid, angry response from the Russian Orthodox Church.
Moscow church described the new appointments as a “Constantinople invasion in its canonical territory,” reads a message, published on the official website of the Russian Patriarchate Orthodox Church on Sept. 7.
“The Constantinople Patriarchate’s appointment of its own bishops in Ukraine, without the prior approval of the Moscow Patriarch (Kirill) and Kiev Metropolit of All Ukraine (Onufriy) makes this nothing else but a blatant invasion of the canonical territory of Moscow Patriarchate,” Vladimir Legoyda, Russian patriarchate church spokesperson said in a message on his Telegram channel on Sept.7.
“Such actions cannot remain without a response,” he added.
Earlier on Aug. 31 the leader of Orthodox Christians, Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople, met with Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and reportedly supported independence — known as “autocephaly” — for the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.
Soon after the Moscow Patriarchate Church of Kyiv denied this, saying nothing has been decided yet.
Ukraine has three Orthodox churches but only one, which is controlled by the Moscow Patriarchate, is recognized by the universal ecumenical church. In 1992, a breakaway church formed under the name of the Kyiv Patriarchate, which was deemed schismatic by Moscow.
The third one, the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church, appeared in 1921 during the short-lived Ukrainian National Republic and declared independence from the Moscow Patriarchate. It was revived in the 1990s after the disintegration of the Soviet Union.
Since Russia launched its war on Ukraine in the Donbas in 2014, Kyiv has sought autonomy from the mother church in Russia to create its own autocephalous united church that would be recognized by canonical Orthodox churches worldwide.
The divide is, in part, political: Russian Patriarch Kirill has repeatedly expressed support for Russian President Vladimir Putin’s aggressive intervention in Donbas and Crimea.
In April, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko made autocephaly a political goal, which many viewed as a populist move in the run-up to the 2019 presidential election.
