Among the propagandists of the OCU and the Phanar, the thesis of the “repentance” of the schismatics in the form of their “desire to return to the Church” is being spread.
Like, if the Ukrainian schismatics wanted to return to the “Church”, then this is considered an act of their repentance and the principle of oikonomia could be applied to them.
Here we see a very primitive manipulation.
The Church is not a disembodied abstraction and is present on a certain territory in the form of a specific canonical structure. It is this structure that represents the Church and has all the necessary rights and powers to resolve church issues within its jurisdiction.
Thus, one should not wish to return from the schism to the Church in any general form. This can happen only by returning to that Local Church, from which they split off and where they created the parallel structures.
In this regard, the actions of Patriarch Bartholomew in Ukraine represent a complete canonical arbitrariness and have no precedents in the history of Orthodoxy.
The Phanar did not return the schismatics to the Church at all, but did legalize the schism, giving them exactly what the schismatics wanted – recognition and actual approval of their actions to the canonical Church. Where can you see any hint of repentance here? On the contrary, it is the encouragement of pride and aggression, which is the exact opposite of repentance.
