It is wrong to proclaim autocephaly on your own, it should be presented as a gift. But if Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia proclaims the autocephaly of the UOC, this will not give her anything. It will not be recognized in the Orthodox world. “For in the Orthodox world they will tell us that you already have de facto one autocephaly, which is recognized by the Greek churches, so why do you need another one?” Metropolitan Filaret of Lviv and Galicia said this in an interview with the Glavkom.

“We need to talk not about autocephaly, not about the structure of the Church, but about the unity of Orthodoxy in Ukraine.

Let’s remember how the dialogue took place in Bulgaria, Poland, Macedonia, when there was a split there. Everywhere the churches did not recognize each other, but everywhere they sat down and talked among themselves. Even before Patriarch Bartholomew bestowed the Tomos on the OCU, members of the Holy Synod of the UOC warned against the negative consequences of such a gift. <…> The schism remained as it was, the formation of the OCU did not change the situation, the set goal of the unity of Orthodoxy in Ukraine was not achieved.

We need to start a moral dialogue with them, we must remove aggression, hatred, anger, confrontation, resentment. We can talk about the church-administrative structure, about canonical-theological issues, but as far as issues of episcopacy are concerned, this should be discussed by all local Churches,” the hierarch said.