A historic council of Orthodox churches is taking place on Crete in the period June 19 – 27, the first of its kind since 787 AD. The Russian, Bulgarian, Georgian and Antioch churches are not attending.

The Bulgarian Orthodox Church explained its stance with a few aspects, causing concern and related to the content of the council papers, the agenda, regulation of voting and the organization of the event. That refusal has raised the issue about the possibility of sanctions, including schism for the ones who wouldn’t attend the council. Famous theologian and lecturer at the Faculty of Theology at Sofia University Dilyan Nikolchev commented for the BNR:

“Formally, schism means the respective sanction and penalty being imposed. We are about to see whether this will happen during the gathering, but Orthodox penalties tend to be more like constructive: the official remark comes first, followed by the reprimand etc. Technically, it could end up with schism, but that is unlikely to happen.”

However, Diyan Nikolchev says there are signs of a crisis within the Bulgarian Orthodox Church, mostly due to political reasons but not everyone admits that. The refusal to join the Crete congregation has had an effect of a continuing self-isolation of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church and a refusal of any gathering participation in the all-Orthodox view. There are rules, strictly obliging diocesans to participate in such gatherings and illness is the only excuse admissible.

The theologian comments the claims on the Russian influence on the decision of the BOC, saying that the issue is not only ecclesiastical. It needs a deeper view inside, bearing in mind the Russian aggressive policy over the past years, both in Europe and globally. The blame is not to be directed towards the Russian Orthodox Church, but towards the geopolitical behavior of the Russian state as a whole. It tries to cover territories in any possible aspect – economic, political and cultural. We witness the ecclesiastical direction of the attack, Associate Prof. Dilyan Nikolchev says in conclusion.

English version: Zhivko Stanchev