Metropolitan Porfiry (Perich) of Zagreb and Ljubljana was elected the new Serbian Patriarch, reports Pravblog.
According to the Telegram channel, the remaining envelopes during the elections contained the names of Bishop Irenaeus of Bach and Bishop Ephraim from Banja Luka.
The new Primate not only does not recognize the OCU, and does not even consider Ukrainian schismatics to be members of the Church. The Serbian hierarch spoke about this earlier in an interview with Novosti.rs.
“The position of the Serbian Orthodox Church is formulated in a conciliar manner and clearly expresses that unrepentant Ukrainian schismatics are not recognized even as members of the Church, not to mention the recognition of the normal autocephalous Orthodox Church,” the hierarch noted. “We really regret and grieve about the destruction of the unity of the Holy Orthodox Catholic Church,” he said.
Metropolitan Porfiry of Zagreb and Ljubljana was born on July 22, 1961 in the city of Bechei, Serbia, into the family of Radivoj and Radoika and was baptized with the name Prvoslav. He graduated from primary school in Churuga, and high school in Novy Sad.
On Fomin week 1985, in the Vysokie Dechany monastery, he was tonsured into monasticism by his spiritual father, Hieromonk Irenaeus (Bulovich).
In 1986 he graduated from the Faculty of Theology of the University of Belgrade.
In the same year, on the Second Spiritual Day, in the Trinity Monastery in the village of Mushutishte, Bishop Pavel (Stoychevich) of Rash-Prizren ordained him a hierodeacon. He then went to graduate school in New Testament Scripture in Athens, where he remained until 1990.
In 1990, with the blessing of Bishop Irenaeus (Bulovich) of Bach, he returned to Serbia and on October 6 arrived at the monastery of the Holy Archangels in Kovil. At the Cathedral of the Holy Archangel Michael on November 21 of that year, he was ordained a presbyter. Soon after this, with the influx of many young novices, the monastery began to grow, and Hieromonk Porfiry was made her abbot. As a resident of the Kovilski Monastery, he gave numerous lectures in various forums, especially zealous against various destructive sects.
On May 14, 1999, at a regular meeting of the Holy Bishops’ Council of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Belgrade, he was elected Bishop of Jaeger, Vicar of the Bac Diocese. His episcopal consecration took place on June 13 of the same year.
In 2004, at the Faculty of Theology of the University of Athens, he successfully defended his doctoral dissertation on the topic “The Apostle Paul’s Ability for Knowledge of God through the Interpretation of St. John Chrysostom.”
On July 29, 2008, the Council of the Republican Broadcasting Agency elected him as its chairman.
On May 24, 2014, by the decision of the Holy Bishops’ Council of the Serbian Church in Belgrade, he was elected the ruling bishop of the Zagreb-Ljubljana Metropolitanate and elevated to the rank of Metropolitan.
On July 13, 2014 at the Transfiguration Cathedral of Zagreb, Patriarch Irenaeus was nominated as Metropolitan of Zagreb-Ljubljana.