At the end of February, in a message timed to coincide with the anniversary of the meeting of the Primates and delegations of the Local Orthodox Churches, held in the Jordanian capital Amman in 2020, His Beatitude Patriarch Theophilos of Jerusalem urged to “get together again for prayer and fraternal communion.” According to the chairman of the Department for External Church Relations of the Moscow Patriarchate, Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk, the meeting in the “Amman format” may take place when the restrictions associated with the pandemic are eased, the communication service of the DECR ROC writes.

“Such a meeting is necessary,” he stressed on the air of the “Church and Peace” program, “because it is very important for representatives of Local Orthodox Churches to meet in order to discuss existing problems. And the mechanism that operated until recently, when such meetings were initiated by the Patriarch of Constantinople, no longer works, because Patriarch Bartholomew joined the schism, concelebrating with the schismatics, and lost legitimacy as the first among equals in the family of the Primates of the Local Orthodox Churches.”

Therefore, the DECR chairman believes, even if the Patriarch of Constantinople convenes such meetings, some Churches may attend them, but very many will evade under various pretexts. “This will be due precisely to the fact that he violated the fundamental principle of the coexistence of Local Orthodox Churches – this principle in church language is called conciliarity, that is, all decisions must be made conciliarly. If decisions are made at the inter-Orthodox level, then Local Orthodox Churches should participate in them,” emphasized Metropolitan Hilarion.