The Antiochian Orthodox Church continues to call upon the Church of Constantinople to enter into dialog on Ukraine

The most serious crisis in the Orthodox world, provoked by the actions of the Constantinople Patriarchate in Ukraine, must be resolved through pan-Orthodox dialog. This was said by His Beatitude Patriarch John X of Antioch and All the East during a meeting with His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia at Danilovsky Monastery in Moscow on January 29, 2019, as reported by Patriarchia.ru.

“We have called for and continue to call for the Ecumenical Patriarch and other eminent religious figures to resolve the existing problems… through dialog, through negotiations, through simple discussion. Since 1960, the foundation of our work has been the concept of consensus, which must be observed even now… We object to the fact that unilateral decisions on a series of Church problems are being attempted at the expense of the entire Orthodox world, which result in schism within it. So for the preservation of our Orthodox unity, we must continue to perform our mission of peace, love and cooperation—all this must lie at the foundation of our work in the future,” said His Beatitude Patriarch John.

The position as stated by the Primate of the Antiochian Orthodox Church is supported by all the bishops of the AOC. In his words, at the recent Council of Bishops, its participants “discussed the necessity of doing everything in order to achieve and preserve our unity.”

“And we want our voice of truth to be heard, because it would be unworthy in our time to remain silent. We must speak about this openly. That is why we called for and continue to call for the Constantinople Patriarchate and other Local Churches towards turning to dialog, to cooperation. It is necessary to make this the founding principle of our efforts,” said His Beatitude.

His Holiness Patriarch Kirill, in turn, noted that the situation in Ukraine “represents a special wound for the Russian Orthodox Church.”

“We are thankful to all the Local Orthodox Churches that express solidarity with the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and provide her with spiritual, prayerful and moral support,” said the Russian Patriarch, mentioning the special participation in this process of both His Beatitude Patriarch John and the Synod of the AOC.

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