Most of the bishops of the OCU were ordained by former Metropolitan Filaret of Kiev (Denisenko), who had been excommunicated and excommunicated from the Church. The head of the DECR of the Moscow Patriarchate, Metropolitan Hilarion (Alfeyev), said this on the air of the Church and the World program, Phraza writes.

“According to church rules, a bishop must be ordained by two or three bishops with the appropriate canonical status. That is, they are not prohibited in the priesthood, not defrocked, not anathematized, not under trial. Moreover, not by persons posing as bishops, but who are not. The so-called bishops of the Ukrainian schism were ordained without observing these fundamental principles,” explained Metropolitan Hilarion.

The bishop emphasized that the main part of the so-called bishops of the OCU was ordained by the former Metropolitan of Kiev Filaret (Denisenko), who had been ousted and excommunicated from the Church.

“From our point of view, they are not bishops. But Constantinople recognized them as such without re-ordination, and Philaret “returned” the episcopal dignity. Today Filaret, who calls himself the Patriarch of Kiev and All Russia-Ukraine, separated from the OCU, created a schism in the schism, and accepts Greek Old Calendarists into communion. At the same time, neither the OCU prohibits him from priestly service, nor does Constantinople revoke its decision to return his dignity,” hierarch explained.

Through the fault of the Patriarch of Constantinople, a situation of canonical chaos has been created in world Orthodoxy, Metropolitan Hilarion noted.