Russia's severance of relations with Constantinople a sign of correctness of Ukrainian path - Poroshenko

Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said this at a meeting with the exarchs of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, which was broadcast live on Ukrainian news channels, according to an Ukrinform correspondent.

"On the apparent order of the Kremlin, the leadership of the aggressor country, the Russian church authorities completely dependent on it announced the breakdown of Eucharistic communion with the Mother Church of Constantinople. I am sure that such a reaction of the spiritual and secular Russian authorities and the church leadership entirely dependent on the Russian authorities only confirms that we are on the right path," Poroshenko said.

The president stressed that in the same way as Russia opposed itself to the whole world because of aggression in Donbas and illegal annexation of Crimea, as well as its "positions" on Abkhazia, Ossetia and Transdniestria, the Russian Church has put itself on the path of self-isolation and conflict with the world Orthodoxy.

At the same time, he stressed that he had hoped earlier that this would not happen.

The head of state also noted that if one compares Ukraine and a prayer service on Sofiyska Square on October 14 with the decision of the Russian Orthodox Church to break off relations with Constantinople, this is an indicator of two different worlds.

"Once again, if you look at the bright faces of more than 30,000 Ukrainians who, at my request, gathered on Sofiyska Square, when all the church hierarchs united in this prayer, I think that these are two worlds - one is for peace, with a prayer to God, and the other is for conflict, for confrontation," he said.

Earlier on October 15, the Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church, which met in Minsk, decided to break off the church communion with the Ecumenical Patriarchate for its decision to grant autocephaly to the Ukrainian Church in the near future.

On October 11, the Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate decided to grant a tomos (ordinance) of autocephaly to the Orthodox Church in Ukraine. Now an assembly is to be held in Kyiv with the participation of the bishops of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kyiv Patriarchate, the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church, and the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate, who appealed to the Ecumenical Patriarch with a request for the tomos. The assembly will carry out the church unification, forming a united local UOC, and will elect its primate.

After that, the head of the single local autocephalous UOC will be handed a tomos as a document (letter).

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