On November 4, 2021, on the Day of Our Lady of Kazan, the Divine Liturgy at the Church of the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia in Sofia, with the blessing of His Holiness Patriarch Neophyte of Bulgaria, was led by Metropolitan Seraphim of Nevrokop.
In his speech at the end of the service, Metropolitan Seraphim said:
“I thank God for the opportunity to serve here with you the holy Divine Liturgy and to ask for the intercession of the Mother of God. With all my heart I wish you that the Mother of God would keep everyone under Her Protection. We are all and always – Her children, and She constantly prays for our unity. She suffers when the Church suffers from division, from contradictions, when our human weaknesses and inclinations lead to separation and the inability to communicate in faith and the joy of the Holy Spirit. Today’s circumstances are clear and troubling. Because our Church in Bulgaria has gone through many years of the schism. But, of course, in scale it was incomparably smaller than that which is now in the Russian Orthodox Church on the territory of Ukraine.
Therefore, especially on this day – Our Lady of Kazan, we send prayers and supplications so that a way to solve it sooner is found – primarily through repentance and a reasonable acceptance of historical circumstances as they are. And they clearly testify to the path of autocephaly of the Russian Orthodox Church, they clearly point to those who have fallen away from the unity of this Local Church. And we are concerned about what is happening today, when they are trying to impose a position that is difficult for Orthodox people to accept”.
