Patriarch Kirill: ROC will never agree to a change of canonical borders of Church in Ukraine

Attempts to separate the Ukrainian Orthodox Church from the Moscow patriarchate will fail, Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia said.

Patriarch Kirill stressed that "our Church will never leave its brothers in Ukraine in trouble and will never disown them. We will never agree to a change of the holy canonical borders of our Church because Kiev is the spiritual cradle of Holy Russia, like Mtskheta for Georgia or Kosovo for Serbia."

As reported by the UOJ, on November 19, Speaker of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine Andriy Parubiy during his visit to Turkey met with the Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople. According to the website of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, Patriarch Bartholomew said that the Church of Constantinople is the Mother Church of Ukrainian Orthodox believers. Earlier Patriarch Bartholomew has repeatedly made such statements.

In 1996, the Patriarchate of Constantinople intervened in the canonical territory of the Russian Orthodox Church in Estonia, taking in the jurisdiction a number of Estonian parishes. The other part, which remained under the jurisdiction of the Moscow Patriarchate, received state recognition only in 2002.

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