Nizhyn, Ukraine, November 23, 2018
Despite the ongoing persecution and propaganda against the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church, its dioceses are remaining faithful to it. A number of dioceses have already openly expressed their support for the Church’s canonical status as a self-governing autonomous body and for their primate His Beatitude Metropolitan Onuphry of Kiev and All Ukraine, and now another has joined them—the Diocese of Nizhyn.
From November 18 to 21, all the deaneries of the Nizhny Diocese held clergy meetings to discuss the issues that have arisen in the life of the Church and Ukrainian society, the diocesan website reports.
The clerics and monastics of the Nizhyn Diocese showed support in an overwhelming majority for the November 13 resolutions of the Bishops’ Council of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, whereby they reaffirmed the break in communion with Constantinople and required the repentance of the Ukrainian schismatics before they return to the Church.
In particular, the clergy emphasized the need for preserving the existing canonical status of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church as an autonomous body within the Russian Orthodox Church, as it fully endows the Ukrainian Church with all rights and capabilities for carrying out its saving mission among the Ukrainian people.
The bishops expressed the same position on November 13 and earlier in a June 25 meeting.
The clergy also expressed their full support for the primate of the Ukrainian Church His Beatitude Metropolitan Onuphry of Kiev and All Ukraine, and firm support for His Eminence Archbishop Kliment of Nizhyn and Prilutsk, aimed at preserving the purity of the faith and the canonical structure of the Church.
The participants in the meeting also noted that the ministry of the primate, Met. Onuphry, is an example for the clergy and all faithful as a witness to the truth of the faith before the world.
The same support for the canonical Church and Met. Onuphry has also been expressed by the Dioceses of Nova Kakhova, Izium, Crimea, Chernigov and Novgorod-Siversk, Kirovograd, Zhytomyr, Lugansk, Mukachevo, Alexandria, Zaporozhye, Kharkov, Voznesensk, Tulchin, Rivne, Kherson, Severodonetsk,Odessa,Dnipropetrovsk, Krivoy Rog, Kamenka, Zaporozhye, and Poltava, and the clergy of the city of Vinnitsa and of the Bar Deanery of the Vinnitsa Diocese.
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