Autocephalous Orthodox Church
The Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church (UAOC) has:
- 1015 communities
- 1 monastery
- 4 monks and nuns
- 628 priests
- 697 churches
- 101 churches are being built
There were autocephalous movements in Ukrainian Orthodox in the 19th and early 20th Centuries but the Soviets under Stalin liquidated them. New communities of the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church began to spring up in August 1989 in western Ukraine. Volodymyr Yarema, a Russian Orthodox pastor in Lviv, left the Russian Orthodox jurisdiction. He and Russian Orthodox Bishop Ivan Bondarchuk joined the movement for autocephaly and parishes began to join the Autocephalous Church.
The spread of autocephaly in Ukraine was part of a dispute with the Moscow Patriarchate. But it was also in the context of a fierce competition with the revival of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. And it was most certainly with the support of Orthodox Churches of the Ukrainian diaspora in North America.
One of the hierarchs of these diaspora Churches, Mstyslav (Skrypnyk), was proclaimed head of the UAOC, and in June 1990 at a council of this Church he was elected Patriarch of Kyiv and all Rus-Ukraine. Dymytriy (Yarema) was his successor from 1993 to 2000 and was then succeeded by Metropolitan Mefodiy (Kudryakov) of Ternopil, currently the head of the UAOC in Ukraine.
Although the UAOC does not currently have official recognition from Orthodox Churches in other countries, it has made steps towards achieving canonical status. For this reason, the name of Metropolitan Kostyantyn, head of the canonically recognized Ukrainian Orthodox Church in the USA (under the jurisdiction of the Patriarchate of Constantinople) is commemorated in the churches of the UAOC.
For current relevant websites, see the RISU page Religion in Ukraine on the Internet
