Lovech, Bulgaria, July 24, 2026
Photo: lovech.bg
His Eminence Metropolitan Gabriel of Lovech of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church has cautioned Ukraine’s Sixth Administrative Court of Appeal in Kiev, which is hearing the case on the possible liquidation of the Kiev Metropolia of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC), that its decision “will have an impact on the life of all Local Orthodox Churches” and will carry “a pan-Orthodox dimension.”
OrthoChristian reported on Wednesday that His Holiness Patriarch Daniil and certain Metropolitans of the Bulgarian Church had addressed the court. Now, the entirety of Met. Gabriel of Lovech’s letter has been published by Archpriest Nikita Chekman, one of the UOC’s lawyers.
The appeal, addressed together with the clergy and faithful of the Diocese of Lovech, concerns the case brought by Ukraine’s State Service for Ethnic Policy and Freedom of Conscience against the Kiev Metropolia of the canonical UOC. It was sent ahead of Wednesday’s hearing. The next hearing is scheduled for September 10.
Met. Gabriel writes that his position continues that maintained by the late Bulgarian Patriarchs Maxim and Neofit, who “always defended and remained in communion solely and exclusively with the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church existing on the territory of Ukraine.”
He cites two letters, from 2015 and 2017, in which Pat. Neofit warned Ukrainian authorities that legislative proposals under consideration were “anti-Church in their very essence,” “of an openly discriminatory character,” and “without precedent in the contemporary civilized world,” creating “a legal basis for the seizure of churches of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church by schismatics and extremists.”
In those letters, Pat. Neofit stated: “The only canonical Orthodox Church of Ukraine is the Ukrainian Orthodox Church,” and warned that “any infringement of its interests may prove disastrous and destructive both for the entire Ukrainian people and for Ukrainian statehood.”
Met. Gabriel also draws on the Bulgarian Orthodox Church’s own experience of schism between 1992 and 2004, which was overcome, he writes, “through the joint efforts of the clergy and the faithful, with the support of our sister Orthodox Churches, through the determination of prudent and enlightened statesmen, as well as through the decisions of the Bulgarian courts and the European Court of Human Rights.”
He notes that the Bulgarian Synod had once described that schism by stating: “The Bulgarian Orthodox Church is being crucified by ill-intentioned officials, ambitious schismatics, compliant magistrates, and shortsighted politicians.” He states that this experience gives grounds to say that “the juridical destruction of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church would constitute an irreparable act of harm against the Church of Christ, to which it belongs, and would be far more difficult to overcome than a schism.”
Met. Gabriel further states that the UOC has, under Ukraine’s Law No. 3894-IX on the protection of the constitutional order in the sphere of religious organizations, been “’pre-condemned’ simply because it is CANONICAL.”
He also cites the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, whose report found that Ukraine has failed to demonstrate the necessity and proportionality of its measures aimed at dissolving religious organizations, including the UOC.
The letter closes with an appeal to the judges for impartiality, citing 2 Chronicles 19:7 and Deuteronomy 1:16–17, and states that the interference of secular authorities in the affairs and existence of a canonical Orthodox Church “is impermissible from the standpoint of the Sacred Canons and the rules of the Ecumenical Councils.”
Photo: Archpriest Nikita Chekman
Photo: Archpriest Nikita Chekman
Photo: Archpriest Nikita Chekman
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