MOSCOW, November 6. /TASS/. Russia and Greece will not be creating artificial obstacles in the wake of a church dispute, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Wednesday after his talks with Greek counterpart Nikos Dendias.
"As far as the impact of the situation in the church world on intergovernmental and interstate ties between Moscow and Athens is concerned, we are not the least willing to artificially create problems and obstacles on the way of our mutually beneficial cooperation in all fields," Lavrov noted. "I will reiterate that no artificial obstacles are going to be created to our intergovernmental and interstate relations."
Nevertheless, according to Lavrov, in the first half of 2019, Russian tourist arrivals to Greece shrank drastically compared to the same period of 2018.
"Of course, we can expect far fewer pilgrims visiting those eparchies of the Greek Orthodox Church, which the Russian Orthodox Church has severed Eucharistic communion with," the Russian foreign minister explained noting that each person should make own decisions.
On October 17, the Holy Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church ordered to "sever prayerful and Eucharist communion with whose hierarchs of the Greek Church who have entered or will enter in such communion with representatives of the Ukrainian uncanonical schismatic groups." The Holy Synod authorized Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia to cease commemoration of the name of the Greek Orthodox Church’s primate in case the latter takes any steps indicating he recognizes the Ukrainian church autocephaly.
On October 12, 2019 the Archbishops’ Council of the Orthodox Church of Greece recognized the right of the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople to grant autocephaly to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, which the Russian Orthodox Church does not recognize as a canonical church. The Orthodox Church of Ukraine, created on the basis of two uncanonical organizations - the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church and the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kiev Patriarchate - received autocephaly in 2018 at the decision made by Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople. The other Orthodox churches did not declare they recognized the newly-established ecclesiastical organization as a canonical one.
Patriarch Bartholomew’s decision to grant autocephaly to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine was the reason why the Russian Orthodox Church on October 15, 2018 severed full communion with the Patriarchate of Constantinople.