On January 28, 2022, the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church, having read the communiqué of the Holy Synod of the Patriarchate of Alexandria published on January 12, 2022 in connection with the establishment of the Patriarchal Exarchate of Africa by the Russian Orthodox Church, adopted the statement published below (Journal No. 1). Translations of the journal and the adopted statement of the Holy Synod into English and Greek will be published on the website of the Communication Service of the Department for External Church Relations of the Moscow Patriarchate and on the official website of the Russian Orthodox Church Patriarchia.ru.
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Members of the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church got acquainted with the communiqué of the Holy Synod of the Patriarchate of Alexandria published on January 12, 2022, dedicated to the establishment of the Patriarchal Exarchate of Africa by the Russian Orthodox Church.
The Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church considers it necessary to respond to the attempts made in the document to distort the true reasons and circumstances for the formation of the Exarchate.
The decision of the Moscow Patriarchate is explained in the communique by “the fact of recognition of the autocephaly of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church” by His Beatitude Patriarch Theodore of Alexandria.
Such a statement is based on a deliberately false thesis, since the Ukrainian Orthodox Church both existed and still exists as an independent part of the Russian Orthodox Church in its administration. The Ukrainian Church did not ask for and did not receive any autocephaly. On the contrary, she resolutely rejected the process of granting the so-called tomos of autocephaly, imposed on her from the outside and supported by the then state authorities of the country and schismatics. This has been repeatedly and publicly stated in the official statements of the Council of Bishops and the Synod of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, in the speeches of its archpastors, clergy, monastics and laity, the vast majority of whom wished and wish to maintain unity with the Moscow Patriarchate.
The so-called autocephaly was granted by the Patriarchate of Constantinople not to the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church — the largest confession in Ukraine, which currently has 108 bishops, 12,381 parishes, 12,513 clergymen, 260 monasteries and 4,630 monastics — but to a group of schismatics who have fallen away from it and continue to enmity against her. It was from these persons, who did not have the legal consecration and grace of the priesthood, and from their like-minded people that the Patriarchate of Constantinople, contrary to the canons, formed the “autocephalous church”. And it was with this schismatic, graceless structure that His Beatitude Patriarch Theodore of Alexandria entered into communion.
The Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church notes with sorrow the distortion of Orthodox ecclesiology manifested in the implementation of the scenario of the so-called Ukrainian autocephaly. However, this distortion was not allowed by the Russian Church, as stated in the communiqué of the Synod of Alexandria. It is found in the acts of the Patriarchate of Constantinople, which illegally invaded Ukraine, as well as in the statements of its high representatives. Attempts to approve the first Primate according to the diptych as “the first without equals” in the Orthodox Church, who supposedly has the exclusive right to grant and withdraw autocephaly at his own discretion, to tear away parts of them from the Local Churches, to unilaterally revoke documents more than three hundred years old, to single-handedly cancel judicial the decisions of the Councils of Bishops of other autocephalous Churches to arbitrarily “restore” persons who have never held holy rank are an undeniable departure from the patristic teaching about the Church and the centuries-old Orthodox Tradition.
Members of the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church remember the speeches of the Primates of the Orthodox Church of Alexandria in support of the canonical Church in Ukraine in the bosom of the Moscow Patriarchate, including the statements of His Beatitude Patriarch Theodore, which he repeatedly made in the past until recently. As His Beatitude testified in an interview in 2016, he has always taken “the position that the Ukrainian Church is an integral part of the Russian Orthodox Church.” In 2018, while visiting Odessa, the Primate of the Patriarchate of Alexandria called on the faithful to be faithful to “the canonical Church of Ukraine, headed by His Beatitude Metropolitan Onufry.”
However, on November 8, 2019, His Beatitude Patriarch Theodore unexpectedly announced the recognition of the Ukrainian schismatic group, began commemorating its leader at divine services, and on August 13, 2021 entered into direct Eucharistic communion with him.
As is known, the recognition by His Beatitude Patriarch Theodore of the schismatic structure in Ukraine caused rejection, including within the Alexandrian Orthodox Church itself. Many of its clergy publicly spoke out in defense of the canonical Ukrainian Church, declared their disagreement with the clearly illegal decision of their Primate, and did not want to be in canonical submission to the one who embarked on the path of schism.
For two years the Russian Church did not respond to the appeals of the African clergy that came to her, but patiently waited for His Beatitude Patriarch Theodore to change his mind. However, during this time, His Beatitude did not limit himself to commemorating the head of one of the Ukrainian schismatic groups in diptychs of the Orthodox Primates, but entered into Eucharistic communion with him and other “hierarchs” of this structure. These mournful events convinced the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church of the need to respond to the appeals received and to form, under these exceptional circumstances, a Patriarchal Exarchate in Africa.
Such a difficult decision, taken in the situation of recognition by the Patriarch of Alexandria of the Ukrainian schismatics, is in no way an expression of a claim to the canonical territory of the ancient Church of Alexandria, but pursues the only goal – to give canonical protection to those Orthodox clerics of Africa who do not want to participate in the lawless legitimization of the schism in Ukraine.
We call on His Beatitude Patriarch Theodore II of Alexandria and the archpastors of the Most Holy Church of Alexandria to stop supporting the Ukrainian schism and return to the canonical path in order to preserve the unity of Holy Orthodoxy.
Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church received 102 clergymen from eight African countries into the Moscow Patriarchate
The main thing: 102 clerics of the Patriarchate of Alexandria from eight African countries were accepted into the jurisdiction of the Russian Orthodox Church.
Details: The Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church decided to accept the clergy in accordance with the petitions submitted earlier, patriarchia.ru reports.
The Synod also formed the Patriarchal Exarchate of Africa as part of the North African and South African dioceses, the head of the Patriarchal Exarchate of Africa to have the title of “Klin”. Appointed Archbishop Leonid of Yerevan and Armenia as Metropolitan of Klin, Patriarchal Exarch of Africa with the assignment of governing the North African diocese and temporary administration of the South African diocese.
The pastoral responsibilities of the Diocese of North Africa include the Central African Republic, the Republic of Cameroon, the Republic of South Sudan, the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, the Federal Republic of Somalia, the Republic of Seychelles and all other African states to the north of them. It also included stauropegial parishes of the Moscow Patriarchate in the Arab Republic of Egypt, the Republic of Tunisia and the Kingdom of Morocco.
The pastoral responsibilities of the Diocese of South Africa include the Democratic Republic of Sao Tome and Principe, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Republic of the Congo, the Republic of Gabon, the Republic of Equatorial Guinea, the Republic of Kenya, the Republic of Uganda, the Republic of Madagascar and all other African states to the south of them. The stauropegial parish of the Moscow Patriarchate in the Republic of South Africa also became part of the South African Diocese.
As previously reported, after the concelebration of Patriarch Theodore with the head of the OCU, Epiphanius, a number of clerics of the Church of Alexandria declared their unwillingness to communicate with schismatics.
Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church called on the Church of Alexandria to refuse support for the schism
The Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church that has just ended, having read the communiqué of the Holy Synod of the Patriarchate of Alexandria in connection with the establishment of the Patriarchal Exarchate of Africa by the Russian Orthodox Church, adopted a statement.
The Synod considered that the Church of Alexandria, which called the actions of the Russian Orthodox Church an “intrusion” into the canonical territory of the Orthodox Church of Alexandria, presented the circumstances of the establishment of the Exarchate of Africa in a distorted form.
“The Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church considers it necessary to respond to the attempts made in the document to distort the true reasons and circumstances for the formation of the Exarchate,” the Synod’s resolution says.
Having once again explained in detail the circumstances – namely, the absence of autocephaly of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, the so-called tomos of autocephaly imposed from the outside and supported by the past state authorities of Ukraine, which was accepted only by schismatics at odds with the canonical church, and the entry into communion with the schismatic structure of His Beatitude Patriarch Theodore of Alexandria – The Synod noted with regret the distortion of Orthodox ecclesiology (the doctrine of the Church of Christ – ed.).
At the same time, the recognition by His Beatitude Patriarch Theodore of the schismatic structure in Ukraine caused rejection within the Alexandrian Orthodox Church itself. Some of its clergy publicly spoke out in defense of the canonical Ukrainian Church, declared their disagreement with the obviously illegal decision of their Primate and did not want to be in canonical submission to the one who embarked on the path of schism.
“For two years, the Russian Church did not respond to the appeals of African clergy that came to it,” the Synod’s statement emphasizes, “but it patiently waited for His Beatitude Patriarch Theodore to change his mind.
But the situation only got worse. His Beatitude Patriarch Theodore not only continued to commemorate the head of the Ukrainian schismatics in the diptychs of the Orthodox Primates, but also entered into Eucharistic communion with him and other “hierarchs” of this structure. These mournful events convinced the Russian Orthodox Church that it was necessary to respond to the appeals received from the clergy and to form a Patriarchal Exarchate in Africa in these exceptional circumstances.
Such a difficult decision, the statement says, is not an expression of a claim to the canonical territory of the ancient Church of Alexandria, but pursues the only goal – to give canonical protection to Orthodox clerics who do not want to participate in the lawless legitimization of the schism in Ukraine.
The statement ends with a call to His Beatitude Patriarch Theodore II and the archpastors of the Most Holy Church of Alexandria to renounce support for the Ukrainian schism and return to the canonical path.
by the way
Priests who moved from the Alexandria to the Russian Orthodox Church were asked to leave the churches and housing with them, said the Patriarchal Exarch of Africa, Metropolitan Leonid of Klin. Some families remained on the street, they were sheltered by relatives and parishioners.
“The clergy unquestioningly accepted the order to vacate the places of service and residence and left,” RIA Novosti quotes the words of Metropolitan Leonid.
However, he drew attention to the fact that the eviction of the families of priests took place in different ways. For example, in one of the parishes, after the priest was expelled from the church, on the instructions of the local bishop, icons that were brought from Russia were torn off and thrown under the door of the exiled rector’s house.
Now such priests are helped by their parishioners and the Russian Orthodox Church. “We are now collecting information on how many people found themselves without housing,” Metropolitan Leonid specified.
