Filaret’s European deanery consists of 7 parishes and 5 clergymen, and the process of forming parishes in other countries continues, additionally for those which are operating in Germany, Italy, Spain, Austria, Belgium and Luxembourg. If we recall that about 8% of Ukrainians consider themselves to be parishioners of the UOC-KP, then in Europe, out of 4 million people, it will be about 300,000 and there is a perspective, the deanery noted in a comment for telegra.ph.

“At the beginning of 2019, before the Local Council convened by the Patriarch, we thought that we would treat the OCU as an autocephalous church and we wanted this. However, later it turned out that we should go to the Greek diaspora, and the situation has changed radically”, said the dean of the Kyiv Patriarchate.

It is also noted that the OCU renounced Ukrainians outside the country, and later began to infringe on Filaret’s rights, and also allowed the creation of parallel structures in Ukraine itself in the form of an exarchate.

Not all the parishes remained in the structure of the Deanery of the UOC-KP, which deals specifically with European countries: for example, two parishes have left in Germany, as well as communities in Italy, France and Austria, went to the Church of Constantinople. In addition, even before the creation of the OCU, the whole Swedish deanery had gone to the ROC (it is not specified whether it is the structure of the Russian or Romanian Church, – ed.), “possibly because there were no ethnic Ukrainians among the clergy”.