I know I have no business coming into The Ancient Way, and if not allowed please remove. I have had an interest and a moderate understanding of Orthodoxy. Can someone explain, in a EO for Dummies kind of way, the issue with the Ukraine Church and the Russian Orthodox in the context of this thread? Thank you for helping me learn!
In 2014, there was a pro-EU coup in Ukraine (Ukraine, as a country, is split between pro-Russian and pro-Western, and the pro-Western faction seized power after the pro-Russian president made a pro-Russian economic decision), which led to a civil war when Russia invaded Ukraine and annexed a part of Eastern Ukraine.
This whole conflict became a problem of Ukrainian Nationalism and Russian Nationalism, which always existed but now was greatly exaggerated, and this bled into religion.
Canonically, Ukraine was and is under the territory of the Moscow Patriarch, and was recognized as such by the rest of the Church. In the 90s, a group broke communion with Moscow to have an autonomous, self-governing Church (obviously, Pro-Western and nationalistic) and this Church was seen as schismatic and unrecognized by any actual Orthodox Church.
Patriarch Bartholomew came in, claiming that Moscow never actually owned Ukraine, and recognized this schismatic group as canonical. Russia broke communion with Constantinople in response, believing it to be an infringement of their rights.
And behind the scenes, there’s clear evidence that the United States State Department has been involved with this whole process of recognition.
This whole process has led to a lot of violence, with the schismatics even violently seizing the Russian owned Churches, claiming they have a right to own it.
And now, the Church of Greece (a separate body from the Ecumenical Patriarch) has recognized the schismatic Church as canonical.
