The Patriarchate of Constantinople in Lithuania complains about the activities of the Lithuanian Orthodox Church

Representatives of the diocese of the Patriarchate of Constantinople operating in Lithuania have again complained about the activities of the Lithuanian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate. The Lithuanian Exarchate of Phanar claims that the LOC MP misleads believers from Ukraine who “do not understand their ideological affiliation.” Volodymyr Seliavko, a cleric of the Lithuanian Exarchate of Phanar, said this in an interview with Delfi.

“The Moscow Patriarchate is now very persistently hiding its affiliation with Moscow, thus trying to deceive ordinary parishioners, especially Ukrainian refugees, explaining that ‘no, we are just the Lithuanian Orthodox Church’ — there is no such thing,” — Seliavko said.

The cleric of the Lithuanian Exarchate of Phanar called on the priests of the Lithuanian Orthodox Church to file claims against Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia because of his position on the Russian-Ukrainian war and to distance themselves from the Russian Orthodox Church. Seliavko argues that the Patriarchate of Constantinople founded its structure in Lithuania only because the LOC became a tool of Russia in this country.

“If we call such a person our father, our guide, we are with him. This is quite normal-you can consider him your father, but say so openly: “Patriarch, you are wrong.” And so it should be in the church. There are rules that a priest, any priest, is obliged to disobey his bishop if he commits a crime. And in this case, it is a moral crime. A war crime. The Patriarchate of Constantinople returned to Lithuania only because the Moscow Patriarchate is fully instrumentalized by the Kremlin and pursues the Kremlin’s policy,” — he concluded.

Earlier, the head of the Vilnius-Lithuanian Diocese of the Russian Orthodox Church (LOC MP), Metropolitan Innocent of Vilnius and Lithuania, declared his fundamental disagreement with the content of the final document adopted at the XXV Congress of the World Russian People’s Council, which called the war in Ukraine “sacred” and added that after its end, Ukraine should “enter the zone of exclusive influence of Russia.”