The Council of the Lithuanian Orthodox Church has spoken out against bills to seize churches

The Council of the Lithuanian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate (LOC MP) held an emergency meeting at which it expressed strong opposition to initiatives to seize historic religious sites. Church leaders fear that the adoption of these bills would violate the constitutional rights of believers and provoke interreligious conflict in the country.

At the center of the discussion were two bills introduced by deputies from the “Union of the Fatherland – Lithuanian Christian Democrats” faction. The bills propose transferring a number of significant sites to the state, including the Holy Spirit Monastery, the Cathedral of the Assumption, and several historic churches in Vilnius and Veivis. The Church emphasizes that these initiatives may be aimed at transferring Lithuanian Orthodox believers to the jurisdiction of the Patriarchate of Constantinople.

Representatives of the Council of the Lithuanian Orthodox Church categorically rejected accusations of posing a threat to national security, noting the absence of any evidence or facts to support such claims. According to the Church’s position, such measures are discriminatory and could lead to the organization’s removal from the list of traditional religious communities in Lithuania.

In response to the current situation, with the blessing of Metropolitan Innokenty of Vilnius and Lithuania, weekly prayer services and akathists to the Mother of God have been instituted in all parishes and monasteries of the diocese. The Church continues to call on the authorities to preserve religious peace and protect citizens’ rights to freedom of religion.

As a reminder, we previously reported that representatives of the Diocese of the Patriarchate of Constantinople, which operates in Lithuania, have once again complained about the activities of the Lithuanian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate. In the Phanar’s Lithuanian Exarchate, officials claim that the Lithuanian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate is misleading believers from Ukraine who “do not understand ideological affiliations.”