A unifying cathedral was opened in Kyiv to create the Ukrainian Church independent of the Russian Orthodox Church

In the morning of St. Sophia in Kiev on the morning of December 15, the unifying cathedral was opened, which is expected to take the Ukrainian Orthodox Church independent of the Moscow Patriarchate, accept its charter and choose the Primate in the rank of Metropolitan of Kiev.

"The cathedral in Kiev can be a decisive step that summarizes years of effort aimed at creating a local autocephalous Orthodox Church in Ukraine," the website of the non -canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kiev Patriarchate (UOC -KP) says.

The report notes that church hierarchs, priests and laity are taking part in the Unification Council. According to the Ukrainian media, the Patriarch Bartholomew arrived on the cathedral as an honorary guest (not a delegate).

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The bishops from three Ukrainian churches - the UOC of the Communist Party, the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church (UAPC) and the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate (UOC -MP) also arrived on the cathedral. It was reported that 10 hierarchs will be represented, but, according to theGromadske Internet channel, only two lords arrived from the UOC-MP-Metropolitan Pereyaslav-Khmelnitsky and Vishnevsky and Metropolitan Vinnitsa and Barsky Simeon. Both of them supported autocephaly.

Before the opening of the cathedral, the Union of Orthodox Journalists, citing "own sources" announced the seizure of Vinnitsa Holy Preobrazhensky Cathedral immediately after the morning service.

The organization’s website says that about 20 young people of sports physique drove up to him and took the keys to all the premises of the complex from the guard, ”and also demanded that the UOCs pick things up and leave.

The head of the Synodal Department of the Moscow Patriarchate on the relationship between the Church with society and the media, Vladimir Legoyda, did not confirm this information, RIA Novosti reports.

Thousands of people gathered on Sofia Square

The cathedral is held closed, the portal "Crimea. Realities" reports. Representatives of the media were not allowed to the territory of the reserve Sofia Kyiv and the Sofia Cathedral itself.

Thousands of people gathered in Sofia Square. As noted by the New Gazeta , there is data on an organized transportation of people by buses.

A large screen was installed on the square for the broadcast of the prayer service, the performances of the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko and the representative of the Patriarchate of Constantinople.

The unification cathedral is expected to last one day. According to the Russian Air Force Service , at first, delegates must accept the charter of the new Ukrainian church. The draft of this document was prepared by the Patriarchate of Constantinople and approved by its Synod on November 29. Consultations on his final version continued until the last.

Further, the cathedral by secret vote will choose the Primate of the new church. Three candidates nominated by participants in the cathedral will take part in the first round. The chosen of them will be considered the one who gains more than half of the votes of the participants in the cathedral.

If the winner does not determine in this way, the second round of voting will pass. Two candidates will take part in it who gained the largest number of votes in the first round. The current Metropolitan of the UOC -KP Filaret did not nominate.

According to Gromadske, from the UOC -KP, the applicants for the post of head of the local church are Metropolitan of Pereyaslavsky and Belotserkovsky Epiphanius and Metropolitan Lutsk and Volynsky Mikhail. However, anyone from the participants in the cathedral will be able to put forward their candidates. The elected metropolitan will later receive from the hands of the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew Tomos about autocephaly (a letter of independence).

The Russian Orthodox Church (Russian Orthodox Church) is categorically against the provision of aftocephalus of the new Ukrainian church. On October 15, she decided tofully break the Eucharistic communication with the Patriarchate of Constantinople, and then declared Patriarch Bartholomew a schismatic.

On December 14, the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia sent appeals to the heads of world churches, general secretaries of the UN and OSCE, as well as the heads of France and Germany (as part of the Norman Four) about violation of the rights of hierarchs and believers of the canonical UOC MP.

According to the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, "the intervention of the leaders of the secular Ukrainian state in church affairs acquired the nature of rude pressure on the episcopate and clergy of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which allows us to talk about the beginning of full -scale persecution."

Patriarch Kirill turned to religious and statesmen to make every effort to protect the episcopate, clergy and believers of the UOC from "discrimination and pressure from the Ukrainian authorities, to defend the freedom of conscience and religion enshrined by international law."