Metropolitan Mytrofan of Luhansk and Alchevsk, head of the Department for External Church Relations of the UOC-MP, commented on the actions of the Ukrainian Embassy in Serbia, which posted on its social media accounts the text of greetings from the head of the OCU Epifany to the newly elected Patriarch Porfiry of Serbia.
This is reported by the Information and Educational Department of the UOC-MP.
According to Metropolitan Mytrofan, this means that the Ukrainian authorities at the state level support the "pseudo-religious organization "OCU" and thereby violate the Constitution and the law on freedom of conscience.
"According to the Constitution, the state must be equidistant from all faiths. But in practice, it turns out differently. It turns out that the OCU is "more equal than others." For some reason, our Embassy in Serbia does not place greetings from His Beatitude Onufriy to Patriarch Porfiry. This once again shows that the laws and Constitution are not observed in Ukraine, everything is very sad, but we are no stranger to it," the hierarch of the UOC - MP said resentfully.
The head of the DECR of the UOC-MP immediately expressed doubt that the greeting of Primate Epifany will force the Serbian Patriarch to recognize the OCU since the newly elected Patriarch, according to the representative of the Moscow Patriarchate, stands "on canonical principles and stands for church unity."
On February 18, the Council of Bishops of the Serbian Orthodox Church elected Metropolitan Porphyrius Peric of Zagreb-Ljubljana as Patriarch.
The head of the OCU congratulated the new head of the sister Serbian Orthodox Church.
I congratulate the co-brother of the elected Patriarch Porfiry on accepting his vocation to be the Primate of the sister Serbian Orthodox Church. I wish the heir to the throne of St. Sava, Patriarch porphyry, many blessed years of service to his local church, the pious people and the fullness of Orthodoxy!" Metropolitan Epiphanius' message of greetings reads.
The well-known theologian Archimandrite Kirill (Govorun) stated that the newly elected Serbian Patriarch is not against Ukrainian autocephaly per se, but he is not ready to take any side at the moment.