Pat. Irinej of Serbia about Ukraine: As if a bomb was thrown into the house

Patriarch Irinej of Serbia

The events around the Church in Ukraine are a great temptation for all Orthodoxy, said the Primate of the Serbian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Irinej.

“This is not something external but a phenomenon that affects our home from inside,” reports his words Interfax-Religion. “Probably, those who harbor evil against Orthodoxy thought it out well, and what is happening in Ukraine seems to be a bomb having been thrown into our house.”

During the meeting with Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Rus, Vladyka Irinej expressed the opinion that the Ukrainian church issue is exclusively political, yet Universal Orthodoxy must "take this matter very seriously and solve it."

The Primate of the Russian Orthodox Church in response stated that the attempts to tear the Ukrainian Church from the Russian Church and Kosovo from Serbia are “in a way links in one chain.”

Patriarch Irinej arrived in Moscow for celebrations on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the election of the head of the Russian Orthodox Church to the patriarchal throne.

Earlier, Vladyka declared that “neither the Serbian nor the other Orthodox Churches will accept the emergence of a certain “Orthodox Pope”, meaning the actions of Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople in Ukraine.

None of the Local Orthodox Churches, except for Constantinople, has yet recognized the Ukrainian OCU and does not intend to take part in the enthronement of its head Epiphany.

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