UKRAINIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH (UOC)

UKRAINIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH (UOC). His Beatitude, Metropolitan Volodymyr (Sabodan) of Kiev, primate of the autonomous Ukrainian Orthodox Church, is the only recognized head of the Ukrainian Church by the Ecumenical Patriarchate and world Orthodoxy (qq.v.). The UOC synod of bishops includes thirty hierarchs and governs fifty-five hundred parishes, twenty-five dioceses, thirty-seven monasteries, seminaries in Odessa, Lutsk, and Kiev, and schools in Chernigov and Pochayev, as well as the Ecclesiastical Academy. Most of Ukraine’s thirty-five million Orthodox believers remain faithful to this Church, autonomous under Moscow, which has canonically controlled ecclesiastical activity in the Ukraine for three centuries.

In December 1993 Metropolitan Volodymyr gave the following interview in New York, which briefly describes the present situation: “The Local Council of the Russian Orthodox Church, which elected Metropolitan Aleksy of Leningrad to be primate and Patriach of the Russian Orthodox Church, as well as the two Councils of Bishops of the Russian Orthodox which followed it, gave the Church, which had previously been known as the Patriarchal Exarchate of Kiev and All Ukraine, a new title-the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. It has been granted full independence and freedom for self-government. In other words, it has all the rights and opportunities which an autonomous church possesses. His Holiness, Patriarch Aleksy, does not interfere in our affairs and we have our own Holy Synod which resolves all ongoing problems of Church life at its meetings. We have the opportunity to govern ourselves, however, we are not an autocephalous (q.v.) Church but an autonomous Church which has certain abilities and possibilities. Today there is the issue, which some believers especially in the western regions of Ukraine hold, that the Church should have full independence and self-government in the status of a local Church. In eastern Ukraine and other regions there are other points of view. The people there do not want that kind of full independence. The issue is being studied. We have appealed to His Holiness, Patriarch Aleksy, requesting that he raise this issue with all the primates of the local autocephalous Churches and that if this is the will of the episcopate, clergy, monastics, and faithful, then the issue of full independence which results in an autocephalous local Church will have to be resolved.” (“Orthodox Church in America News,” Alex Liberovsky, Interviewer, December, 1993, page 6.)

Nonetheless, there is ecclesiastical chaos in Ukraine today. In addition to the canonical UOC headed by Metropolitan Volodymyr, there exist two parallel Orthodox jurisdictions: The Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church (UAOC) surfaced in 1989 under the leadership of the now deceased Patriarch Mystaslav (Skrypnik), who lived in exile, and is now headed by Bishop Dimitri (Yarema) as the new “Patriarch of Kiev”; it has about 800 parishes. Another group, the Ukrainian “Patriarchate of Kiev” (UOC-KP), was founded a year ago with parishes loyal to the former Metropolitan Philaret (Denisenko), but which has recently elected Bishop Volodymyr (Romaniuk) as patriarch. Romaniuk, a former priest of the Patriarchate of Moscow, was imprisoned for sixteen years in Soviet camps for his religious convictions. The candidacy of the more controversial former Metropolitan Philaret (Denisenko) was rejected.

The enthronement of the new primate took place on 24 October 1993, at St. Sophia Cathedral in Kiev, which was opened especially for this service. This latter group has enjoyed widespread support from President Leonid Kravchuk and the Ukrainian government, although the March 1994 elections displayed a division between Russian- and Ukrainian-speaking parts of the country. Canonicity of the two dissident churches is not officially recognized by any Orthodox Church. In August 1992 the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church (Uniates), more prevalent in West Ukraine, had 2,719 parishes.

Disputes over property have frequently boiled over into street violence, pitting one congregation against another. Ukrainian television routinely broadcasts rival services of the two dissident branches. The situation is in a continuing state of flux. (See Kievan Rus’; Russian Orthodox Church; Unia.)