Coup d’etat, putsch, schism.
In the Ukraine, no one - or hardly anyone - is trying to paint a rosier picture when describing what is happening in the local Church which follows the Russian Orthodox rite.
The Church, which run by Metropolitan Vladimir since 1992, is the largest, in terms of followers, places of worship and priests, of the three Orthodox Churches that coexist in the Ukraine (we ought to add the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church, linked to the Vatican) as a result of its tormented political history in the last century, which saw the country constantly torn between a frail autonomy and its ties to the cumbersome Russian neighbour.
Vladimir is 77 years old and is stuck in hospital after a serious heart attack, which struck him last October. At the end of January he was practically relieved of his powers by the Church Synod, which has placed the management of the Kiev diocese in the hands of Bishop Paul.
Moreover, on 21 February the same Synod also relieved of all powers and functions the young bishop Alexander who has been Vladimir’s right hand man and spokesperson. The accusations made against him resemble those made in the days of the Soviet Union and include the leak of some ‘confidential’ letters, which apparently ‘dishonoured’ the synod.
Metropolitan Vladimir condemned by letter the Synod’s decisions from his hospital bed, deeming them illegitimate as he himself ought to be the only person with the authority to summon the conference of bishops. As a result, the clerics who led this ecclesiastical ‘putsch’ have put forward the idea of summoning a medical commission to have the metropolitan declared incapable of running the Church.
It may all seem like a simple power struggle. The event however should be seen in connection to the Church’s relationship with the Orthodox Patriarchate of Moscow, which the Ukrainian Orthodox Church formally depends from.
The substantial autonomy of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church run by Vladimir, only dates back to 1990. In that year, as the Soviet Union was dissolving, the Patriarch of Moscow chose to grant Ukraine - which up until then had only been a province - more freedom to self-govern, mirroring what was happening within the Soviet government structure.
The move was not enough and two years later, in 1992, the nationalist forces got the better of the situation and Metropolitan Filaret, who had been leading the Ukrainian Church on behalf of Moscow, decided to cut definitively all ties with ‘Mother Russia’ and founded within the Orthodox creed an autonomous Church with its own ‘head’, in other words a Church which answered only to itself.
Moscow reacted by excommunicating Filaret, who said that before decided on the split, men from the FSB (the Russian secret service, once known as KGB) had taken part in a Synod in which the Church of Moscow had tried to persuade him to resign.
Today, many people in Moscow and in the Eastern part of Ukraine, where Russian is the main language, regret the decisions that were made in the 90’s. There are those who openly talk about placing the Ukrainian Church once more directly under the authority of the Russian Patriarchate, like at the time of the Soviet Union. The Patriarch of Moscow, Cyril, apparently suggested that Vladimir might now be no longer capable of running the Church and that there is the need for a closer collaboration with the Mother-Church in Russia.
The clerics, upon reviewing the Church statute might, as a first step, want to eliminate the adjective ‘Ukrainian’ from the official title of the Church, in order to avoid giving a foothold to the nationalists.
Vladimir and his pupil Alexander are also apparently ‘guilty’ of building relationships with the Ukrainian society and especially with other Christian Churches. Not long before he was removed, Alexander, who was also in charge of the Department for External Church Relations of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (in other words he was the ’minister of foreign affairs’) had established good relations with the Greek-Catholic Church, which Moscow had always looked upon with suspicion.
The Ukraine is a key piece in the complex reconnection game between Moscow and Rome and it might even bring about the much hoped for meeting between Pope Benedict XVI and Cyril. In 2010 the ‘minister of foreign affairs’ of the Patriarchate of Moscow, the Metropolitan Hilarion had pointed out that the controversies between Moscow and the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church are the principle obstacle to the possible reconciliation between Moscow and Rome.
In a recent interview, Metropolitan Vladimir seemed to backtrack. He accepted the legitimacy of the Synod’s decisions - his dispossession and the dishonourable removal of his former right hand man- even though he reiterated his personal regard for Alexander. He warned, however, that the risk of a schism is still real.