Montenegro, December 31, 2019
Photo: mitropolija.com
A number of events will be held in the Montenegrin Metropolis of the Serbian Church in connection with the adoption of the anti-Church law that empowers the government to confiscate property from the Serbian Church.
Among them, all the parishes of the Serbian Metropolis of Montenegro will ring funeral bells every two hours until the feast of the Nativity, reports the Metropolis’ website, noting that by adopting the law, the Montenegrin Parliament “buried law and justice.”
Following the evening services, the clergy will also serve a special moleben to the Most Holy Theotokos in times of troubles and temptations.
The controversial bill was adopted by the Parliament late in the evening of December 26-27, and was signed into law by the President the next day.
His Grace Bishop Metodije of Diokleia was beaten and hospitalized by police as protests erupted throughout the country. He recovered quickly and is calling upon all Orthodox faithful and Montenegrin people to remain calm and peaceful in the face of such turmoil in the Balkan nation.
According to the new law, “All religious buildings that were property of the State of Montenegro before the loss of its independence and merging into the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes in 1918, and which subsequently did not become the property of a religious community in the proper legal way, will be recognised as state property,” the Secretariat-General of the Montenegrin government earlier said.
