December 13, 2022, the Holy Synod of Bulgarian Orthodox Church (BOC) convened in regular session under the chairmanship of Patriarch Neophyte of Bulgaria.
Source: doxologiainfonews
The autocephaly of Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU) is not yet on the agenda. The Synod has not taken a decision on this matter.
In the spirit of the methodological guidelines laid down by Metropolitan Antony of Volokolamsk, BOC Synod decided to shift the focus from the most important topic at the moment – the Tomos on autocephaly of OCU, to the less important topic – the recognition of the fake Tomos from Serbian Orthodox Church, which she provided to the so-called “Macedonian Orthodox Church”-Archdiocese of Ohrid.
Bulgarian Church recognizes this false “Tomos”. Regarding the name “Archdiocese of Ohrid”, the Synod considers that this church should be called “Orthodox Church in Republic of North Macedonia”.
Patriarch Neophyte of Bulgaria will include in his Diptychs the name of Archbishop Stefan of Ohrid, but as “Archbishop of Republic of North Macedonia and Skopje Stefan”, since BOC does not recognize the title with which Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew received into Eucharistic communion Archbishop Stefan and his church. Also, the Synod of Bulgarian Church does not agree the name given by the Ecumenical Patriarchate – “Archdiocese of Ohrid”, because this name belonged, according to BOC, to Bulgarian Church, and the successor of Archdiocese of Ohrid, according to BOC charter, is Bulgarian Patriarchate.
The name that Bulgarian Church will use for Archdiocese of Ohrid is “Church in/of Republic of North Macedonia” or something similar, so as not to create tension with the Greek-speaking churches.
Obviously, Metropolitan of Volokolamsk did an excellent job during his meetings with Metropolitans Gavriil of Lovech, Daniil of Vidin, Nikolay of Plovdiv (Philippopolis), and Bishop Gerasim of Melnik, to whom he gave special methodological instructions.
It is important to note that on December 9, 2022, the editor-in-chief of Doxologia Infonews, Jordan Georgiev, during his participation in the program “Counter comment with Asen Genov”, stated that today, December 13, he expects decisions on the recognition of autocephaly of Orthodox Church of Ukraine, and on December 25, Nativity of Christ, there is a desire to hear how Patriarch Neophyte of Bulgaria pronounces in his diptychs the name of Metropolitan Epiphany of Kyiv.
In other words, the visit of the Metropolitan Antony of Volokolamsk was a complete success.
The decision of the Holy Synod of Bulgarian Patriarchate is completely in the spirit of Russian church propaganda and ecclesiological heresy.
Tomos for autocephaly can only be provide by Ecumenical Patriarch. All the tomos for autocephaly of the new local churches are provided by Ecumenical Patriarch. If a head of a local church provides such a “tomos”, this “tomos” has no canonical value for Orthodox Church.