Ukraine's Orthodox Christian clerics will gather for a meeting next week that is expected to form a new, independent Ukrainian Orthodox Church, the country's leader said, as the authorities ramped up pressure on priests to support the move, the AP website reports today (December 7, 2018).
The Ukrainian Church has been part of the Russian Orthodox Church for centuries, but Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has pushed for the creation of an independent church.
Poroshenko said that Orthodox communities would gather on December 15 to adopt the charter of the new Ukrainian Church and choose its leader.
The newly formed community would then be expected to receive independence from the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, the Istanbul-based institution considered the "first among equals" of leaders of the world's Orthodox Churches that has already drafted a charter of an independent Ukrainian Church.
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