At the end of March, the Swiss newspaper Daily Zeitung made public some quite interesting information about a new twist in the relationship between the Constantinople and Moscow patriarchates. According a certain titular bishop, who chose not to disclose his identity, from the entourage of Metropolitan Meliton and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I, the Constantinople Patriarchate (CP) plans to begin fundamental revisions of decisions made in 1686 by the then Constantinople Patriarch Dionisius. At that time, buckling under the pressure of circumstances (the political will of the Grand Vizier of the Ottoman Empire, as well as the temptation of 120 sables and two hundred chervontsi (Russian gold coins) brought as a gift by Moscow envoys), Patriarch Dionisius ignored Constantinople’s long-term interests in favor of short- term expediency, agreeing to place the Kyiv Diocese under jurisdiction of the Moscow Patriarchate (MP). Although almost 300 years have passed since, the CP has not reconciled itself to the loss. For example, in 1924, Patriarch Gregory VII said in the Patriarchal and Synodal Canonical Tomos: “The Kyiv Diocese and the Orthodox dioceses of Lithuania and Poland, dependent on the former, were separated from Our Throne in 1686 and attached to the Holy Moscow Church contrary to canonical rules.”
Thus the Ecumenical Patriarch is again tackling this problem. According to the above-mentioned Swiss newspaper, the point is to gradually, step by step, negotiate with “our beloved brother, the Most Holy Patriarch Aleksiy II,” some possible changes on the world’s Orthodox map. Everybody is well aware this will be a complicated, painful, and long process. However, the Swiss newspaper’s informer thinks truth is on the CP’s side. Moreover, political realities have changed. For, before the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union disintegrated, there were at least logical, if not canonical, grounds for the Ukrainian church to be part of the MP: Ukraine was then part of the empire and the principle of unity was still valid. Now this kind of justification is invalid.
Why is this old church problem being raised just now? Most likely because in mid-February, in the interview with a Greek newspaper, Patriarch Aleksiy II said there were no theological objections to the Moscow church taking the top rung in the Orthodox world and the Moscow Patriarchate becoming the second (along with Catholic Rome) hub of Christianity. In other words, it was said openly that the Third Rome, Moscow, intends to supplant the Second, Constantinople. On the other hand, Orthodox politicians from Phanariot quarter of Istanbul assessed long ago that, after the churches of Ukraine, Belarus, and Lithuania, once part of the Kyiv Diocese, were placed under Constantinople’s jurisdiction, the CP would become the world’s largest Orthodox church.
One more “minor” circumstance: neither of the high parties is interested in the opinion of Ukrainian Orthodox believers in this historical face-off. As if we, illiterate pagans, had been baptized by Greek missionaries only yesterday.
