Ecumenical Patriarch does not recognize Moscow’s ecclesiastical jurisdiction over Ukraine

"As far as we know, no other act changing the canonical state of Kiev or revision of the condition to commemorate Constantinople has ever occurred; nor of course has there been any such change on the part of the Mother Church ceding Kiev completely to Russia," Patriarch Bartholomew stated in his opening remarks at the Synaxis of Hierarchs of The Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople.

As mentioned, already from the early 14th century, when the see of the Kievan Metropolis was moved without the canonical permission of the Mother Church to Moscow, “there have been tireless efforts on the part of our Kievan brothers for independence from ecclesiastical control by the Moscow center.”

The tome proclaiming Moscow as a Patriarchate does not include the region of today’s Metropolis of Kiev in the jurisdiction of Moscow, the Ecumenical Patriarch noted.

On September 2, it was decided at the Bishops' Council in Istanbul that the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople could grant the Ukrainian Orthodox Church the tomos of autocephaly without the consent of other churches.

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