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Recently, the well-known Greek theologian, Prof. Vlasios Phidas, in his article The Autocephaly of the Church of Ukraine and Objections to the Serbian Church[[i]] descended upon His Holiness Patriarch Irenaeus of Serbia, to be more precise, upon the position of the Serbian Orthodox Church on the Ukrainian issue expressed in the Letter of February 6, 2019, written by the Serbian Church Holy Synod to Patriarch Bartholomew and in articles written by the outstanding Serbian theologian Bishop Irenaeus of Bac. As is known, the Serbian Church does not recognize the creation of the self-styled autocephalous so-called Orthodox Church of Ukraine (hereinafter OCU) believing that, on the one hand, the Patriarch of Constantinople acted “in the canonical territory of the Russian Orthodox Church” and, on the other, that the OCU “was founded and acquired autocephaly through a dialectical leap of unrepentant schismatics who became real canonical hierarchs, clergy and laity”.

The tone of lay Vlasios Phidas’s articles towards Serbian hierarchs fails not only to fit in the limits of church diplomacy or church etiquette but also to observe conventional human politeness. Just take at least the following utterance of the grand church figure:

“The whole spirit of this letter was apparently aimed to pursue lucrative aspirations or fixed ideas because these far-fetched assumptions are backed up mistakenly and fecklessly, and what is more, in an arrogant or/and improper way, as if ‘they keep the affairs of the Church’. The drafters of the letter apparently demonstrate a sampling ignorance with regard to not only real historical events and appropriate authoritative sources concerning relationships between the Metropolis of Kiev and the Moscow Patriarchate as they were in the last four centuries, but also with regard to the traditional canonical criteria concerning the relationships of the Orthodox Church with Orthodox clergy, monks and lay people who in this or that way seceded from its church body”.

Apparently, Vlasios Phidas thinks he is a Patriarch who reads a lecture to an ignorant layman. Unfortunately, Constantinople increasingly gets into the habit of talking with other Orthodox Churches in the spirit of “papal diktat”. But let us put aside for a while the ethical problems and Mr. Phidas’s arrogance based on something unknown. Let us consider the issue on its merits.

Prof. Phidas puts out the following accusations against His Holiness Patriarch Irenaeus and hierarchs of the Serbian Church:

“Apparently, the drafters of the unacceptable letter of the Holy Synod of the Serbian Church in response to His Most Divine All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarchate, due to their partiality or antipathy, have recklessly distorted the already universally known events associated with the Synodal Action of Ecumenical Patriarch Dionysius IV (1686). Thus, in their ‘first objection’, they arbitrarily and mistakenly state that allegedly the Metropolis of Kiev cannot in the least be identified with today’s ‘Ukraine’ which includes dozens of other dioceses, on one hand, and on the other hand, that allegedly the Metropolis of Kiev ‘was ceded in 1686 to the Moscow Patriarchate as is shown by documents’ of Patriarch Dionysius”.

In 1686, the Metropolis of Kiev did not correspond indeed in its boundaries to today’s state of Ukraine. Chernigov, Novgorod-Seversky, etc., liberated from the Poles as far back as the 1500th, was subordinate to bishops installed original by the Metropolitan of Moscow and later by the Patriarch of Moscow. The same is true for the relatively modern Eastern Ukraine – the Kharkov Region and Donbas, which were in the territory of the Kingdom of Moscow. Today’s Bukovina was in the jurisdiction of the Metropolitan of Wallachia. The Crimea, ecclesiastically, was subordinate to the Bishop of Taurida. In the 17the century 1970s-80s, Right-Bank Ukraine was partially subject to the Metropolitan of Kamenets-Podolsk (the part which was captured by the Turks) and partially to the Bishop of Lvov (the Polish part).[[i]] Generally, it should be mentioned that Ukraine as it is at present and the Metropolis of Kiev are a fruit of the lengthy collection of the Little Russian lands, which began since the 1654 Pereyaslav Council and was concluded in 1945 at the Yalta Conference with the recognition of the Soviet western borders. Accordingly, the phenomenon of the Metropolis of Kiev as it is at present is bound up with the First Patriarchal, Synodal and the Second Patriarchal Periods of the Russian Orthodox Church and, accordingly, the Russian Orthodox Church, both de jure and de facto is the Mother Church for the Ukrainian Orthodox Church since it created the latter in its present form.

Vlasios Phidas puts forward in passing a very strange idea: “These canonical criteria have a considerable weight in their application, when the withdrawal has been accomplished through a persistent refusal of ones not only to obey under the pressure of the power claims of the Moscow Patriarchate but also through a refusal of others to accept a fair canonical demand for the official bestowal of church autocephaly to the Orthodox Church of the Republic of Ukraine now independent of the Soviet Union”.

Let me ask: every time when secular independence is gained, should a church metropolis automatically demand church autocephaly? Is it always lawful? But in this case, the Patriarchate of Constantinople unlawfully ruled over the Serbian Church for almost one hundred years and for several dozens of years over the Romanian Church after Serbia and Romania gained independence in 1831 and 1858 respectively. According to this logic, the rupture of church communion with the Bulgarians from the first half of the 19th century to the first half of the 20th century was lawlessness on the part of the Patriarchate of Constantinople since the Bulgarians lawfully demanded church autocephaly, especially after Russia liberated them from the Turkish slavery[[ii]]. If Vlasios Phidas is right, then the Patriarchate of Constantinople has no right whatsoever to claim the so-called “Northern Territoryies” including Mount Athos, as long as they are already incorporated in the Republic of Greece independent from Turkey.

Furthermore, Phidas distorts historical facts by alleging that “by the 1686 Synodal Action the Ecumenical Patriarch merely gave Patriarch Joachim of Moscow a “permission” on behalf of the Ecumenical Patriarch only to install or to put on the throne the Metropolitan of Kiev elected by a Council of the Metropolis of Kiev, certainly not giving him the jurisdiction over the Metropolis of Kiev”.

It is strange to hear such speeches from the mouth of a canonist. If it is so, then the Patriarch of Constantinople has no jurisdiction whatsoever over Asia Minor and Thrace, just as their adjoining territories. Indeed, Canon 28 of the Fourth Council (of Chalcedon) states the following: “Therefore the God-pleasing Archbishop of Constantinople shall install only the primates of Pont, Asia, and Thrace while they shall be elected by the Councils of respective dioceses”[[iii]].

Indeed, precisely Canon 28 of the Council of Chalcedon is used by the Patriarch of Constantinople to prove his claim to primacy not only of honour but also of power in the Orthodox world. From of old, the right to install a bishop, archbishop or metropolitan to a respective eparchy or diocese implied jurisdiction. As for the conditions for making the liturgical mention of the Patriarch of Constantinople, in the Russian Orthodox Church it used to be made without any diplomatic conditions: in Orthodoxy, the Most Holy Patriarchs, beginning from that of Constantinople, were mentioned at the liturgy by the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia and not only by him.[[iv]] However, this did not at all mean the recognition of the power of the Patriarch of Constantinople. Whereas the letters of the Ecumenical Patriarch to Tsars Ivan and Peter, as well as to hetmans point to the real transfer of power over the Metropolis of Kiev to the Patriarch of Moscow.

Finally, let us address the 1686 Patriarchate of Constantinople’s synodal resolution on the installation of the Metropolitan of Kiev. To avoid loose talks, let us cite the Greek original and its translation after it:

«… (ας) ἀμοιρεῖν, ἡ ὑποταγὴ τῆς μ(ητ)ροπόλ(εως) ταύτης Κιόβου ἀνετέθη ὑπὸ τὸν ἁγιώτατον π(ατ) ἀδύνατον ὂν παρὰ τοῦ οἰκουμ(ενικοῦ) θρόνου ἐκτελεῖσθαι τὴν εἰρημένην χειροτονίαν, κ(αὶ) οὕτω ἀρχιερατικῆς προστασί ριαρχικὸν τῆς Μοσχοβίας θρόνον»

[“… since it is impossible for the Ecumenical throne to administer the aforementioned ordination and thus deprive (the metropolis) of hierarchal primatial ministry, its subjection was entrusted to the most holy patriarchal throne of Moscow”][[v]].

Alack, the professor expressed a false opinion by stating: “Thus, they recklessly express their opinion on ‘all range’ of issues as well, using the fictitious method of assumed premise (petitio principii), although the Moscow Patriarchate has never officially stated, at least until the official disintegration of the Soviet Union on December 5, 1991, that the Orthodox Church of Ukraine belongs to the jurisdiction of the Moscow Patriarchate, i.e., as its canonical territory”.

Actually, the Russian Orthodox Church has always reckoned the Metropolis of Kiev and the episcopacy of Little Russia as its dioceses: the Metropolitan of Kiev was a member of the Sacred Governing Synod in the pre-revolution time (and often the senior member present) and a permanent member of the Holy Synod in the Soviet time. Photos of the Metropolitan of Kiev and other Ukrainian bishops and information about them were published on a regular basis in the Moscow Patriarchate’s calendar. As hierarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church, they were included in the annually published reference editions of other Local Churches including the Church of Constantinople. Metropolitan of Kiev and Galich had the title of “Patriarchal Exarch for All Ukraine”. And naturally, he was the exarch of not the Patriarch of Constantinople but of the Patriarch of Moscow. Extended to Ukraine were the same principle of governance as to other dioceses; the Odessa Seminary was in the jurisdiction of the Moscow Patriarchate Education Committee. Until 1991, the Exarchate of Ukraine made money allocations to the fund of the Moscow Patriarchate. Overall, the so-called Ukrainian Exarchate lived in the Soviet time lived the same life as the whole of the Russian Orthodox Church did.

To consider the sincerity of Prof. Phidas on its merits, let us cite statements he made about the canonical status of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church before 2018, using the remarkable study made by Protopresbyter Anastasios Gotsopoulos[[vi]].

  1. “Patriarch Dionysius of Constantinople transferred the Metropolis of Kiev to the canonical jurisdiction of Moscow (1687)”[[i]].
  2. “Peter the Great abolishes patriarchate in Moscow and introduces Synodal governance. This decision is approved by the Ecumenical Patriarchate. Thus, the Metropolitan of Kiev comes to participate in the Synod of the Russian Church as one of the three permanent members (together with the Metropolitans of Moscow and of St. Petersburg).[[ii]]
  3. “Kiev Theological Academy is one of the four major academies of the Moscow Patriarchate”[[iii]].
  4. “Metropolitan of Kiev was the chairman of the 1917 All-Russia Local Council, which restored the patriarchal office”[[iv]].
  5. “The 1945 Council was attended by Patriarch Christopher of Alexandria, Patriarch Alexander III of Antioch, Patriarch-Catholicos Callistrat of Georgia; Metropolitan Herman of Thyateira, representative of the Patriarch of Constantinople; Archbishop Athenagoras of Sebastia, representative of the Patriarchate of Jerusalem; Metropolitan Joseph of Skopje, representative of the Serbian Church; Bishop Joseph from the Romanian Church, etc. Among other things, this Council drafted ‘A Provision for the Governance of the Russian Orthodox Church’. According to its Article 19, the Holy Synod composed of six people included the Metropolitan of Kiev as its permanent member[[v]].
  6. Finally, according to Prof. V. Phidas, “both Kiev and all Ukraine, as well as monasteries in Ukraine are parts of the dioceses of the Russian Church”[[vi]].

Therefore, according to previous statements that V. Phidas made for many years, in the latest centuries, the Orthodox in Ukraine took part in all the aspects of the Moscow Patriarchate’s church life. Then a question arises: which example of Vlasios Phidas is to be believed – that of 1966-2017 or that of 2018-2019? Then the following question arises: does he himself believe, or, as church fathers used to say, does he merely “steers the truth”?

Vlasios Phidas asks a rhetorical question: “Whether the Moscow Patriarchate has a canonical right to impose most serious bans on the Metropolitan of Kiev since the Holy Synod of the Ukrainian Church of the independent Republic of Ukraine, which he chairs, has officially demanded to declare its autocephaly, just as all the autocephalous Orthodox Churches have done in modern times without being subjected, however, to corresponding non-canonical consequences”.

Prof. Phidas probably means the Bishops’ Council held on November 13, 1991, when, under the pressure of L. Kravchuk’s nationalistic government and threats of then Metropolitan Philaret and Ukrainian nationalists, most of the Ukrainian hierarchs signed an appeal drafted by Philaret by the order of Ukrainian authorities and addressed it to His Holiness Patriarch Alexy of Moscow. However, as a result of a free discussion on the future of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church at the Moscow Council of the Russian Orthodox Church held from March 31 to April 5, 1992[[vii]], and overwhelming majority of the Ukrainian diocesan bishops disavowed their signatures explaining that they acted under compulsion in fears of oppression from Metropolitan Philaret and the Ukrainian authorities[[viii]].

During the Kharkov Council of May 25, 1992, which determined the further life of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church, only two hierarchs remained on Philaret (Denisenko)’s side. Then a question arises: which of the Holy Synods Prof. Phidas referred to?

There is no more truth in the professor’s following statements:

“In this sense, from the canonical perspective it is also necessary to evaluate ‘the second objection’ of those who drafted the letter of the Holy Synod of the Serbian Orthodox Churches, in which they reject ‘the Church of Ukraine declared as autocephalous’ as ‘canonically invalid and actually imposed by force’, and for this reason support this ‘objection’ by canonically arbitrary and completely ungrounded and far-fetched arguments that allegedly on one hand ‘schismatics remain schismatics’, and on the other ‘once a schismatic, a schismatic for good’”.

After the so-called ‘Tomos’ was proclaimed, in the diocese of Rovno and Sarny alone, 14 parishes were taken away and 60 parishes were abolished. In total, from December 2018 to May 2019, about 120 parishes were torn away from the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. It happened according to the same raid pattern:

“First an assembly of a territorial community of local people posing as members of the community is arranged. The organizers proceed from the ‘principle’ that ‘once you come to church, you are already a parishioner’. In practice, a considerable part of the assembly attendees is brought from other places. The opinion of real parishioners is grossly ignored. The assembly adopts a resolution prepared beforehand on the transfer of the church of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate to the OCU. The ‘OCU activists’, sturdy-built men of brigand or special services appearance, who are ignorant of the Creed and even the Lord’s Prayer, armed with an angle grinder or crow-bars would rush to the church doors, brake them or cut off the locks and replace them with locks of their own. In case the faithful lined up in front of them to defend their shrine, they would be beat up, with some ending in hospital. If the faithful worshiped in a church, they would be thrown away from it. This orgy would be concluded with singing the Ukrainian anthem”[[ix]].

Will Prof. Phidas dare deny that these persecutions were carried out under the anti-church law adopted on January 17, 2019, by the Ukrainian Supreme Rada to establish a procedure for changing the subjection of religious organizations, to mix deliberately an ecclesial and territorial communities, to provide for an opportunity to drive the faithful away from their church through a simple village (or neighbourhood) assembly to which complete strangers can be brought or driven together?

Or perhaps Prof. Phidas is not aware of another anti-church law under which religious organizations “with their center in the aggressor state” are obliged to state it in their full official designation? Let us point out, by the way, that the clergy of these organizations are forbidden from taking pastoral care of servicemen.

Or perhaps the esteemed scholar has not the first idea about the monstrous pressure put by the Ukrainian authorities on the canonical hierarchs of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church up to their summons to the Ukrainian Security Service (SBU)? Or perhaps he is ignorant about of the tremendous role that the US State Department played in promoting the OCU project?

Or perhaps the professor is not familiar at all with Marco Pompeo’s obsessive statements in support of the ICU? The level of secular support for the OCU, both internal and international, is really sweeping off scale, and Epifaniy (Dumenko) and his supporters wholly and fully fall under Apostolic Canon 30: “If any bishop obtain possession of a church by the aid of the temporal powers, let him be deposed and excommunicated, and all who communicate with him” (I Ecum.4; VII Ecum. 3; Laodicea 13)[[x]].

Let us come back to Phidas’s text though: “That is why they support this ‘objection’ with canonically arbitrary and completely ungrounded and far-fetched arguments by alleging that ‘schismatics remain schismatics’, on one hand, and ‘once a schismatic, a schismatic for good’”.

Regrettably, the professor, softly speaking, is cunning here as well. From the point of view of the Serbian Synod, once a schismatic, a schismatic for good, but only until repentance. And from the perspective of canon law and authentic Orthodox theology, “the sin of schism is not washed away by the blood of martyrdom”.

Further on Phidas notes: “It goes without saying that the Orthodox Church is carrying out her customary feat not sparing any possible sacrifices in order to bring schismatics back to the unity of the church body”.

The question is whether the Church of Constantinople really performs this feat or politicians just demonstrate this feat on her behalf? And what do they sacrifice – their own interests or interests of others? And do schismatics really come back to unity with the body of the Church, which is possible to do only through repentance, or they remain outside it with their impenitence and pride, but only pretend to reconcile with the Church? It was precisely what happened in December 2018, as the leaders of the schism failed to make the least repentance for their actions; however, they were admitted to communion as if nothing happened.

For Vlasios Phidas however the Ukrainian schismatics are not such by the highest standards. Here are an example of his thinking: “The canonical tradition clear shows that both through Metropolitan Philaret of Kiev as the leader of those who disagreed with the power claims of the Moscow Patriarchate and his use of the canonical right to appeal to the Ecumenical Patriarch and through his acceptance in church communion as this appeal was officially considered and evaluated by the Synod, all the hierarchs, clergy, monks and lay people who followed him were automatically restored in church communion in keeping with the unanimous canonical tradition”.

The esteemed professor is cunning again. Attempts to appeal to Constantinople were made by the Ukrainian schismatics as far back as since 1992, but until May 2018, Constantinople did not respond to these appellations in any way. Moreover, in his official statements both in 1992 and in 2008, etc. Patriarch Bartholomew maintained that “hierarchs” of the UAOC and the UOC KP were schismatics. It turns out that for as many as 26 years Constantinople viewed the appellations of the Ukrainian victims of the super-power claims of the Moscow Patriarchate and “saw the light” only a year ago! A question arises: what has happened in the last years? And what has happen is the following: in the last moment the Russian Orthodox Church did not come to attend the Council of Crete and did not support the super-power claims of the Patriarchate of Constantinople and as a revenge for it Patriarch Bartholomew did recognize the Ukrainian schismatics. Let alone the fact that Phanar’s American patrons, on whom he is wholly dependent, persistently “asked” for it…

Furthermore, highly questionable is Patriarch of Constantinople’s right to consider appellations when it concerns the whole Universal Church. Constantinopolitan canonists seek to present the Council of Chalcedon Canons 9 and 17 as if they give the Patriarch of Constantinople the right to make unconditional judgements concerning the whole Universal Church. However, the interpretation of such principled canonist as John Zonaras destroys their claims. In addition to the above, and to prevent any thought that the Patriarch of Constantinople has an unconditional right over all the metropolitans and beyond the boundaries of his Patriarchate, let us cite the following from Zonaras’s interpretation of this canon.

“The Patriarch of Constantinople is recognized as judge not over all the metropolitans but only those who are subordinate to him. For neither metropolitans of Syria, nor those of Palestine or Phoenicia or Egypt are summoned to his judgement against their will, but those of Syria  are to be judged by the Patriarch of Antioch, those of Palestine by that of Jerusalem, while the Egyptian ones are judged by that of Alexandria who ordains them and to whom they are subordinate”.

The wording given by Phidas is puzzling: “Hierarchs, clergy, monks and lay people were automatically restored to church communion”.

The Church is not a plant, and nothing in it is done “automatically”. If a man has never been a bishop or a priest, he cannot become such “automatically”, by an ink stroke of whoever it may be. It concerns every episcopal consecration administered by Philaret Denisenko being banned by the Church and anathematized. Indeed, if a hierarch is deposed and especially excommunicated from the Church, then up to a conciliar judgement is accomplished and he is restored (let us assume for a minute that it is possible in case of Ukrainian hierarchs), he has no right to minister, the more so to ordain others[[xi]]. In this case, he is deposed once and for all without any right to be restored. Accordingly, not only every ordination administered by Philaret Denisenko is uncanonical, but also he himself has altogether lost the right to restoration because of them. Therefore, His Holiness the Patriarch of Serbia is right when he says, “Schismatics remained schismatics” with all their pride and with all their ambitions which, by the way, began appearing immediately after the declaration of the Tomos.

Very characteristic is also the following phrase: “It goes without saying that in their two ‘objections’ the drafters of the letter of response from the Holy Synod of the Serbian Orthodox Church rashly expressed their subjective judgement that they do not recognize ‘the wrongly named council as Uniting as none of the hierarchs of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church participated in it’ (‘the third objection’), on one hand, and, on the other, do not recognize ‘the schismatic hierarchy as an Orthodox hierarchy and the schismatic clergy as Orthodox’ (‘the fourth objection’). Nevertheless, in the ‘third objection’, the drafters of the reply deliberately bypass the fact that the Ecumenical Patriarch invited to ‘the Uniting Council’ both 82 pro-Russian hierarchs and 62 hierarchs who advocated autocephaly”.

In other words, the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which by the way was officially recognized by Constantinople until May 2019 as the only Orthodox Church in Ukraine, from the pen of theologian Vlasios Phidas magically turns into a crowd of 82 pro-Russian hierarchs and the problem of canonical affiliation is substituted with a magician’s craft by a non-existent problem of political and national passions. In addition, they are placed on the same level with the schismatics with most of then having no canonically proper consecration. Finally, the most important thing. If the hierarchs of the canonical Church refused to participate in the so-called “Uniting Council”, then they had very serious canonical reasons for that, namely, non-canonicity of the hierarchs of the UOC KP and UAOC, due to which “the Uniting Council” became canonically impossible and senseless: there was nobody to unite with since the largest Orthodox Church (over 12 thousand parishes) refused to attend it. What Constantinople did is difficult to be named other than the legalization of the schism.

Furthermore, Vlasios Phidas writes the following: “Eighty pro-Russian hierarchs, who were elected under the pressure from the Moscow Patriarchate after ‘autocephalist hierarchs’ broke off in 1992, as can also be concluded from their diptychs, had as their mission to control the Holy Synod of the Ukrainian Church, and for this reason were ordered by the Moscow Patriarchate to refuse to attend. However, if they had come, they would have a majority of the already autocephalous Orthodox Church of Ukraine at ‘the Uniting Council”.

This passage is at best a fruit of ignorance so strange for such a learned a scholar and at worst a malicious lie. First, not 80 but 90 hierarchs. Secondly, far from all of them were elected after 1992 as some of them were consecrated even before the Council of Kharkov, and all of them represent the lawful hierarchy of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which had been recognized by Constantinople up to 2018. Thirdly, what pressure of the Moscow Patriarchate can be spoken about in the territory of sovereign Ukraine where it has almost no resources for such actions? As the two “maidans” in 2004 and 2014 have shown, if the Russian political leaders, unlike American ones, had no levers to influence the situation (except for Crimea), then what can we say about the Moscow Patriarchate with its comparatively small resources? Phidas accuses hierarchs of the Ukrainian Church of having only one task – “to control the Holy Synod of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church” and wonders that they failed to come to “the Uniting Council” since otherwise they would have comprised a stable majority capable of controlling the Synod. Thus, he exposes himself and the contemporary theology of Constantinople as a whole since he cannot presume that the hierarchs could have other motives for their actions rather than the love of power.

In conclusion of his article, Prof. Phidas proclaims “the judgement of history” over the Serbian Church and its immaculate canonical position on the Ukrainian church problem: “This arrogant letter will remain in the archives of the Holy Synod of the Serbian Orthodox Church, just as their belated written proposals to initiate a procedure for the reception of the Holy and Great Council, which will be fully ignored by corresponding church literature”.

Such naïve triumphalism mingled with sincere and respectful self-admiration not only disgraces the venerable theologian but it is also disastrous for the See of Constantinople which has increasingly isolated itself in the Orthodox world due to its anti-canonical actions caused by pride and a wish to play the role of “the Orthodox Vatican” in relation to other Local Churches.

 

Protodeacon Vladimir Vasilik

 

[i] Φειδα Βλ. Ἐκκλησιαστικὴ Ἱστορία τῆς Ρωσίας. С. 273-274. К тому же самому выводу приходит и прот. Ф. Зисис в книге Τὸ Οὐκρανικὸ Αὐτοκέφαλο. С. 79–98.

[ii] Φειδα Βλ. Ἐκκλησιαστικὴ Ἱστορία τῆς Ρωσίας. С. 317–318. Его же. «Ρωσικὴ Ἐκκλησία». ΘΗΕ Т. 10. С. 1055.

[iii] Φειδα Βλ. Ἐκκλησιαστικὴ Ἱστορία τῆς Ρωσίας. Σ. 301–304.

[iv] Φειδα Βλ. Ἐκκλησιαστικὴ Ἱστορία τῆς Ρωσίας. Σ. 335.

[v] Φειδα Βλ. Ἐκκλησιαστικὴ Ἱστορία τῆς Ρωσίας. ΅Σ. 348–349. Его же. «Ρωσικὴ Ἐκκλησία». ΘΗΕ Τ. 10. Σ. 1077. Τζωρτζατου Β. Οἱ βασικοὶ θεσμοὶ διοικήσεως τῶν Ὀρθοδόξων Πατριαρχείων, μετὰ ἱστορικῶν ἀνασκοπήσεων. Ἐν Ἀθήναις, 1972. Σ. 177.

[vi] Φειδα Βλ. «Ρωσικὴ Ἐκκλησία». ΘΗΕ Τ. 10. Σ 1078.

[vii] Цыпин В. А. прот., Петрушко В. И. Архиерейский собор Русской Православной Церкви 31 марта — 5 апреля 1992 г. // Православная энциклопедия. Т. III. С. 552– 555

[viii] Петрушко В.И. Денисенко // Православная энциклопедия. Т. XIV. С. 391.

[ix] См., в частности: Василик Владимир, протодиак. Захваты православных храмов на Украине: механизмы рейдерства и перспективы (http://zavtra.ru/blogs/zahvat_hramov).

[x] Никодим Милаш. Правила Православной Церкви. Т. 1. СПб 1912. С. 89.

[xi] См. об этом: Маркович Константин, протодиак. «Каноны говорят…». О некоторых канонических аспектах «принятия в общение» бывшего митрополита Филарета (Денисенко) и его последователей Синодом Константинопольского Патриархата // https://mospat.ru/ru/2019/01/03/news168568/ См. об этом: Маркович Константин, протодиак. «Каноны говорят…». О некоторых канонических аспектах «принятия в общение» бывшего митрополита Филарета (Денисенко) и его последователей Синодом Константинопольского Патриархата // https://mospat.ru/ru/2019/01/03/news168568

[i] См.: Макарий, митрополит. История Русской Церкви. Т. 6. С. 1450–1470.

[ii] Скурат К.Е. История Поместных Церквей. М., 2000.

[iii] Епископ Никодим (Милаш). Правила Православной Церкви. Т. 1. С. 293. СПб. 1912\

[iv] См.: Желтов Михаил, свящ. Формы поминовения церковных иерархов за Божественной литургией в русской и украинской традиции // Воссоединение Киевской митрополии с Русской Православной Церковью, 1676–1686 гг.:

Исследования и документы. / Под общ. ред. митрополита Волоколамского Илариона. М.: ЦНЦ «Православная энциклопедия», 2019. С. 484–494.

[v] Публикация текста В.Г. Ченцовой. Перевод Д.Е. Афиногенова. См.: Там же. С. 738, 741.

[vi] Гоцопулос Анастасий, протопресв. Небольшой вклад в диалог по вопросу об украинской автокефалии. Ч. 1 // https://mospat.ru/ru/2019/03/15/news171596/#_ftn33

[i] https://orthodoxia.info/news/η-αυτοκεφαλία-της-εκκλησίας-της-ουκρα/