Estonian Orthodox Church Removes Reference to Moscow Patriarchate from Its Statute

The council of the Estonian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate (EOC MP) adopted a new version of the church's statute, which no longer mentions the Moscow Patriarchate, Orthodox Times reports.

The main task of the council's session was to approve ways to achieve greater administrative independence of the church, taking into account the agreements in the negotiations with the Estonian state.

The council adopted a new version of the church's statute, which enshrines independence in church-administrative, church-economic, church-educational and church-civil affairs.

In addition, with reference to the 1993 Tomos issued by Patriarch Alexy II, the name of the church was changed: now it is simply the Estonian Orthodox Church (EOC), without the ‘Moscow Patriarchate’.

It is noted that the Council approved the activities of the Synod in the negotiation process with the state and expressed confidence that the Orthodox in Estonia will be able to find ‘ways and means to heal the schism on the basis of canonicity, mutual respect and equality’.

The Council decided to continue its activities to fully participate in resolving the crisis, instructing the Synod of the GOC to determine the next session at a set time.

The Metropolitan of Tallinn and All Estonia participated in the Council's meeting remotely.

At the end of July, representatives of the GOC MP and the Estonian Ministry of Internal Affairs agreed on further steps to reduce and eliminate the influence of the Moscow Patriarchate on the church. The GOC MP presented its vision of the process of separation from Moscow in two stages. The first stage was to change the charter, and the second was to start consultations with the Estonian Apostolic Orthodox Church (EAO) to find opportunities to unite all Orthodox in Estonia under a single church in the future.

As The Gaze previously reported, the Czech Senate Security Committee called on the government to instruct the security services to check Russian Orthodox churches to counter Russian influence.