Moscow Patriarchate condemns the seizure of an Orthodox church in Ukraine
October 16, 2015. In Konstantinovka (Ukraine), the representatives of the non-canonical Patriarchate of Kiev seized a church of the Purification of the Virgin Mary that is currently under construction, as Interfax – religion reports. The parish is located in the country’s east where an absolute majority of believers are adherents of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate).
The head of the Synodal Information Department, Vladimir Legoyda, condemned this incident by saying that it is not the first time that so-called “Kiev Patriarchate” representatives have used force to illegally seize Orthodox churches on long-suffering Ukrainian land. The fact that the invaders deliberately chose the Intercession of the Virgin Mary Day for ousting the town’s Orthodox residents from their own church, thus leaving them unable to perform a collective prayer on the occasion, is “an eloquent testament” to their moral image”.
He underlined that the Kiev PAtriarchate has turned canonical Church seizures into “a kind of ordinary criminal activity to which the authorities are systematically turning a blind eye”.