The establishment of three new metropolitanates of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church will not influence the relations with the Ukrainian Orthodox Church-Kyivan Patriarchate.
“The Kyivan Patriarchate did not publish a special statement in this regard. Each denomination can organize its life as it wishes. The important thing is that it should not influence the freedom of worship, confession, rights and interests of other Churches,” said the bishop.
According to the hierarch, the establishment of three new metropolitanates in the territory, where UGCC’s influence is considerable, is quite a logical step.
“It is obvious to everyone that UGCC has a significant number of faithful and clergy in the three Galician regions and its historic presence in that region is considerable. Therefore, it is not surprising that UGCC decided to establish the structural units in Ukraine as it has metropolitanates abroad,” explained the bishop.
“The statements of ROC [Russian Orthodox Church] as to complication of the dialogue because of UGCC are just an element of the diplomatic game of Moscow with the Vatican. ROC has used these scary tales of destroyed eparchies, confiscated churches with one purpose, namely, to get something from the Vatican,” commented the bishop on the negative reaction of Moscow Patriarchate to the mentioned development.