Last week, those advocating self-government received a fillip when the Istanbul-based Ecumenical Patriarchate said it was sending two bishops to Ukraine as a step toward declaring ecclesiastical independence for the church there. Ukraine’s pro-Western political leaders have sought step by step to take the former Soviet republic out of Moscow’s orbit after Russia annexed the Crimean peninsula in 2014 and a Moscow-backed insurgency broke out in eastern Ukraine. In an apparent pre-emptive move against Bartholmew’s impending recognition, the Russian Orthodox Church said on Friday it would no longer conduct joint services with the Patriarchate of Constantinople and its own Patriarch, Kirill, will stop mentioning Bartholomew I in his prayers. President Petro Poroshenko is a deacon in the UOC and Constantinople does not view him as “anti-Russian.” Importantly, due to his influence, senior UOC clergy have supported the UOC-KP and smaller Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church in seeking autocephaly. Russian President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters Friday that “worrying information about possible decisions regarding the church in Ukraine causes concern.”

Peskov noted that “the state can’t interfere in the church affairs,” but added that “preservation of the Orthodox unity is the only preferable scenario for Moscow, as well as for the entire Orthodox world.”
The Russian Orthodox Church freezes its relations with the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople over its influence in Ukraine.