From the Religious Information Service<\/a> of the Ukraine:<\/p>\n

MOSCOW\u2014Representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) expressed confidence that foreign structures will not interfere with church problems in Ukraine. In particular, they mean the Constantinople Patriarchate, which, according to the ROC representatives, the Ukrainian authorities hoped to engage in the establishment of a national church separate from the Moscow Patriarchate.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey (Constantinople Patriarchate) understand well that Ukraine is an integral part of the Russian Orthodox Church, that there exists spiritual unity of nations \u2013 Russians, Ukrainians, Moldovians, Belarusians,\u201d noted the head of the Department of External Church Relations of the Moscow Patriarchate, Archbishop Ilarion (Alfeiev) of Volokolamsk, at a press conference in Moscow about the visit of the head of ROC to Istanbul in early July.<\/p>\n

News.ru reports that in the archbishop\u2019s opinion, the very tone of the past negotiations shows that the Constantinople Patriarchate \u201cdoes not envisage stabs in the back,\u201d and gives hope that no \u201cnegotiations, aimed at supporting the schism\u201d will be conducted. The archbishop noted that \u201cno documents in this regard were signed\u201d but the very \u201cclimate\u201d of the negotiations implies a respectful attitude.<\/p>\n

\u201cDespite the complicated situation, the visit of the patriarch to Ukraine will be of a pastoral character and will make a significant positive contribution towards the consolidation of Orthodoxy in Ukraine,\u201d said the archbishop.<\/p>\n

In the hierarch\u2019s opinion, the church problem in Ukraine is becoming \u201cvery politicized,\u201d politicians exploit it for their campaigns. \u201cBut the church was formed for centuries and one cannot act to please the political conjuncture. The questions of the schism in Ukraine should be settled inside the church, without interference from politicians,\u201d stressed the archbishop.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis trip will be of no political character and will be aimed not at passing some resolutions but at supporting the Orthodox believers,\u201d assured Archbishop Ilarion at the press conference.<\/p>\n

During his visit planned for 27 July to 5 August, the head of ROC is to visit Kyiv, Donetsk, Horlivka, Simferopol, Sebastopol, Rivne, Lutsk, and Volodymyr-Volynskyi.<\/p>\n

The third country to be visited by the Moscow Patriarch after Turkey and Ukraine is to be Belarus (September).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From the Religious Information Service of the Ukraine: MOSCOW\u2014Representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) expressed confidence that foreign structures will not interfere with church problems in Ukraine. In particular, they mean the Constantinople Patriarchate, which, according to the ROC representatives, the Ukrainian authorities hoped to engage in the establishment of a national church separate […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1784],"tags":[750,200,204,160,296,170,212,214],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aoiusa.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2887"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aoiusa.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aoiusa.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aoiusa.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aoiusa.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2887"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.aoiusa.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2887\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2892,"href":"https:\/\/www.aoiusa.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2887\/revisions\/2892"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.aoiusa.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aoiusa.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.aoiusa.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}