Holy Synod of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church convenes in Kiev

On 8 May 2012, the Holy Synod of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church held its regular session in the Synodal Hall of the Kiev metropolia under the chairmanship of His Beatitude Metropolitan Vladimir of Kiev and All Ukraine.

The members of the Synod thanked God for the recovery of Metropolitan Vladimir who returned to his post of chairman of the Holy Synod of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. A number of decisions of the Holy Synod, taken while His Beatitude Metropolitan Vladimir was ill, were suspended.

The Holy Synod appointed Archbishop Antony of Borispol chancellor of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and a permanent member of the Holy Synod. Archbishop Antony was released from his duties of chairman of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church’s Department for External Church Relations. Metropolitan Lazar of Simferopol and Crimea was also appointed a permanent member of the Synod. The Holy Synod extended authority of a chancellor of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.

Archbishop Mitrofan of Belaya Tserkov and Boguslav was released from his duties of the chancellor of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and appointed chairman of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church’s Department for External Church Relations. He remains a permanent member of the Holy Synod.

Approved at the session was a Programme for the celebration of the 20^th anniversary of Kharkov Bishops’ Council of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and the 20^th anniversary of His Beatitude Vladimir’s ministry as Metropolitan of Kiev and All Ukraine. The decision was also made to celebrate the 20^th anniversary of the finding of the holy relics of Hieromartyr Vladimir (Bogoyavlensky, died in 1918) and the 20^th anniversary of the celebration of the Synaxis of the New Martyrs and Confessors who had suffered for Christ under the ungodly regime in the 20^th century.

The Holy Synod entrusted an ad hoc commission with working out a document which would express the position of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church on various problems of social life in Ukraine, for instance, on the implementation of the principles of juvenile justice and on the propagation of homosexual relationships. The members of the Synod requested His Beatitude Metropolitan Vladimir to inform the Ukrainian authorities about the concern of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church on these matters.

The decision was taken to support a draft law on amendments to certain laws of Ukraine, relating to the transfer of cultural heritage sites to religious organizations.

The Holy Synod canonized hegumenness Smaragda (Onishchenko, died in 1935) and schema-monk Ilia (Ganzhi, died in 1946) as locally venerated saints, and fixed the day of the celebration of the Podolsk icon of the Mother of God and the commemoration day of St Feofan of Rykhly.

The Holy Synod has also taken decisions on the life of dioceses and monasteries of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.

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Holy Synod of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church convenes in Kiev

Patriarch

Department Chairman

Sermons

Patriarch

Department Chairman

Sermons