www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church

Give me the scoop on the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church. What is its status in relation to the other Orthodox Churches? Thanks.

Dear Cantor Joe,

Were you talking to me?

There are a number of Churches calling themselves by that name, and unless they are in union with Constantinople (USA and Ukrainian Orthodox Church of Canada), or with Moscow (or with Rome ), they are uncanonical from the point of view of both Rome and Orthodoxy.

What I do when confronted with a Church with a similar name is ask them which Patriarchate they are in communion with.

That determines the fact of their canonicity, outside of which they aren't recognized by anyone other than themselves.

I don't think Moscow even recognizes the North American Churches in union with Constantinople - they still see them as being in its backyard.

And Constantinople is no help here.

Orthodoxy, I'll say again, was never a friend of the Ukrainian people.

Not before, not now.

Alex

Alex,

The link below mentions a regularization of consecrations to the episcopate for several of bishops of the UAOC. Was there reason for their ordinations to be doubted in the first place? I mean either one is ordained an Orthodox bishop or one isn't.

http://www.uaoc.org/succession3.html

Dear Cantor Joe,

Yes, the events of October 23, 1921 have a lot to do with the raising of the question of the validity of episcopal consecration here.

As you know, the Sobor of the Autocephalous Ukrainian Orthodox Church gathered in St Sophia's, having failed to obtain canonical episcopal consecration from other Orthodox Churches, and consecrated two "bishops" by having 12 (and more) priests "lay hands" on two candidates.

These two "bishops" then consecrated others and the UAOC movement was born.

There were other formations of the Autocephalous Church in Poland and elsewhere that were canonical, however. The one in Canada was uncanonical until its recent coming into communion with Constantinople.

So this is why the perceived need to show one's "canonicity."

Alex

I never thought I would see the day when Alemayu the Great himself would over generalize. The Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church is welcome to join the family of Oriental Orthodoxy whenever she wishes. Then we would have the heritage of Kiev added on to Ethiopia, Egypt, India, Syria, and Armenia. What could our "opponents' then claim for themselves? Think about it.

Dear Aklie,

Yes, the Kyivan Church has had good relations with the Oriental Churches, especially those of Georgia, Armenia and Egypt!

St Timothy Aelurus was even exiled to southern Ukraine way back when.

I'm certainly not overgeneralizing with respect to Chalcedonian Orthodoxy.

I'm sure Ukrainian Orthodox would be treated well by pre-Chalcedonians however .

You are all so hospitable to begin with!

And one of our theologians once penned an article to say that we should follow the example of the Oriental Orthodox and have our own Catholicosate.

The article got him into "muchos" trouble with the very pro-Roman bishop we had at the time.

And I'm also not generalizing since there are many Chalcedonian Orthodox, as you know, who don't recognize the Oriental Miaphysite Churches as "Orthodox" at all . . .

Those Nestorians, grrrr. . . .

Alex

Actually there HAVE been important discussions between the different Ukrainian Orthodox groups at the Phenar and these should not be dismissed so lightly even considering the obstacles that would be set up for these talks. Let us pray for the unity of the Ukrainian CHurch.
I frankly don't understand this last statement as Orthodoxy is the Faith of a GREAT many Ukrainian people. Do such sweeping statements help matters???? Just a question.

Peace,
Brian

Dear Brian,

Yes, this is a generalization.

Ukrainian Orthodoxy is the religion and tradition of the Ukrainian people. I consider myself to be that, although in communion with Rome.

But the idea that world Orthodoxy is good friends to the Ukrainian Orthodox - well, that is something that many Ukrainian Orthodox I know simply deny.

And if you can show me concrete historical instances where world Orthodoxy was a friend to Ukrainian Orthodoxy, apart from good intentions, then I will repent of my generalization.

But it's nothing I haven't heard from Ukrainian Orthodox themselves before.

And until shown otherwise, I stand by that statement: World Orthodoxy has never been a friend to Ukrainian Orthodox, not historically, not now.

The "Autonomous Ukrainian Orthodox Church" of the Moscow Patriarchate isn't really "Ukrainian" but is, in fact, the ROC in Ukraine.

A case in point of real friendship was when Eritrea asked Alexandria to consecrate an independent Patriarchate for them. And Alexandria did, no questions asked. That's real friendship.

Alex

One of my realtives was one of those bishops that was concecrated witht he laying on of hands. He was later killed by the Soviets.

Whether "world Orthodoxy" said they were canonical or not, I believe they had the best intentions for Ukraine and for Ukrainian Christians. I think they were canonical and prooved their faith through their martyrdom.

ukrainiancatholic

I don't believe that the church body that owns the referenced website has any relationship to the Orthodox jurisdiction in Ukraine, the "Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church."

The above-mentioned website belongs to the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church of North & South America Sobornopravna -- which is, to my knowledge, not in communion with any "canonical" Orthodox Churches.

(Well, neither is the UAOC in Ukraine, but the UAOC in Ukraine was the predecessor of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the U.S.A. under Patriarch Mstyslav, which is now in communion with and under the jurisdiction of the Ecumenical Patriarchate. The UAOC Sobornopravna church was not part of the UOC of the U.S.A.)

Dear UC,

Yes, I believe as you!

As a matter of fact, Patriarch Josef did as well.

He actually recognized the orders of the Bishops of 1921 and readily gave their descendants letters of his recognition - I saw one of them.

He also never referred to St Basil Lypkivsky (canonized by the Church Lemko refers to in Ukraine) as anything other than "Metropolitan."

I certainly have no problem honouring Lypkivsky as a saint and martyr. Mykola Borecky, the Metropolitan who took over from Lypkivsky, was also glorified a saint by that jurisdiction.

When Lypkivsky was confronted with the question that his Church was not in communion with any other Church - he simply said, "Good, no one will try to swallow us up as happened in the past."

The Kyivan Canons of that formation included the restoration of married bishops in the Church, contemporary Ukrainian and many old traditions that were lost or forbidden under Moscow.

The Patriarch of Kyiv, also "uncanonical" held a celebration of the Sobor of 1921 in Ukraine.

While rejecting the idea of the consecrations to have been valid, the intentions you speak of were acclaimed and honoured.

Meyendorff and others mention at least two cases in other Churches that I remember where there were no bishops and so a bishop was consecrated by the laying on of hands by 12 priests . . .

Alex

Yes, but has this ever been recognised as a legitimate practice? Something like this happened in India a few hundred years ago, I think, where the Archdeacon of India was ordained a Metropolitan by twelve priests. I was under the impression that this kind of thing was not canonical, valid, legitimate, whatever. There obviously is a precedent for such things, but have they ever been recognised as legitimate by the Church?

Dear Qathuliqa,

You are right, they are not canonically legitimate.

Although the few Churches who participate in the consecrations feel justified for a number of reasons in doing them.

A number of those bishops were later consecrated "canonically" (I use parentheses so as to try and not offend anyone here with respect to this matter).

Did the bishop in India who was so consecrated have to be re-consecrated or "canonically consecrated" later? Does the Church in India recognize as valid the consecration by "12 priests?"

The canonical rule has always been that "two or three bishops" consecrate another.

However, I've heard the argument that while something is not "canonical," that does not mean that it is not "valid."

Was it a Russian Church that was begun here with the consecration of a bishop by only one bishop?

I don't know.

I do know we used to have all sorts of fights in my family that had Eastern Catholics (difficult people at best ) and the "uncanonical" Orthodox.

The Catholics called the other UO's "samosvyats" or "those who consecrated themselves" .

One Catholic uncle refused to cross himself while passing by one of their Churches. He said "That's not a real Church, what do you mean?"

It did get ugly.

U-G-L-Y - you don't need no allaby - you ugly!

That tune basically described it in my home . . .

That same Church came into communion with Constantinople some years back.

Alex

"The above-mentioned website belongs to the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church of North & South America Sobornopravna -- which is, to my knowledge, not in communion with any "canonical" Orthodox Churches."

Yes. This is the church I was referring to. As I do my map of the Light from the East in America, a computer graphic depicting every temple, I need to know whether I should include this jurisdiction. So, should I include this group of churches on my map? Also, what about HOCNA?

This leads me to an observation and a question:

Observation: I thought the Catholic communion of Eastern Churches in communion with Rome was a mixed bag of peanuts, but now in doing this map I see that the Orthodox Churches are in quite a disarray. I see a separate Romanian Orthodox jurisdiction and a collection of Romanian Orthodox churches under the OCA.

Question: Given the situation of multiple Russian Orthodox Churches and multiple Greek Orthodox Churches, how can one make sense of it all? Can there be an Ecumenical council if four teams of separate representatives show up each claiming to be the TRUE Russian or Greek Orthodox Church?

It seems that there are five grab-bags of uniatism going on: (1) Catholic, (2) Greek Patriarch, (3) Moscow Patriarch, and (4) American Independent, and recently, (5) the Antiochians and their "Western Rite" collection.

Is it all now a game?

Joe T:

This reminds me, you may want to superimpose your map of the "Light from the East in America" on this one:

http://www.glenmary.org/grc/RCMS_2000/maps/Largest_Group.jpg

AmdG