/ world today news/ The Orthodox Church of Moldova (OCM) is suffering losses: the priests are moving to the pro-Romanian structure. The secular authorities, for their part, are increasingly squeezing the canonical religious organization. What will this lead to?
Disappointing statistics
“In connection with the unauthorized and non-canonical departure of the Chisinau Diocese of the Orthodox Church of Moldova, the clergy were removed from office and deprived of the right to perform divine services,” said an official statement on the website of the Chisinau Metropolitanate.
Priests leave their parishes voluntarily, without coercion. Now their fate will be decided by the synod. Practice shows that the highest body of church government is most likely to confirm the sentence.
In recent months, the words “unauthorized”, “non-canonical” and “ban” have become common among the PCM leadership. More recently, at the end of October, a similar verdict was issued: five clerics announced their resignation from the Chisinau Metropolitanate. The reasons for the act are purely material.
“The parishes are subject to huge taxes. We are practically left to our own devices, we have no support, we have no health insurance,” the former priests told reporters at the time.
But the Church of Chisinau was outraged not by this, but by where the disaffected go for a better life. The Bessarabian metropolis – a parallel structure.
“When the time comes when the apple is fully ripe, we will decide what to do next.” We changed the spiritual vector from Moscow to Bucharest,” said priest Petar Storojana at the last sermon.
The fact is that there is a canonical anomaly in Moldova: two Orthodox structures work at the same time. One is the aforementioned PCM. It arose in the middle of the 19th century as a diocese within the Russian Church. And in 1994, it became self-governing, retaining the jurisdiction of the Russian Orthodox Church.
The other is the Metropolitanate of Bessarabia, controlled by the Romanian Orthodox Church (RumPC), one of the 16 local Orthodox churches of the Byzantine tradition. It arose in 1918, when Moldova became part of the Kingdom of Romania. Two decades later, under the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, the territory was ceded to the Soviet Union. Then the metropolis ceases to exist. Half a century later, a sharp political struggle began in independent Moldova: some advocated for the preservation of sovereignty, others for unification with Romania. Pro-Romanian politicians and clerics took advantage of this – in 1992, they revived the Bessarabian Metropolitanate, which was ecclesiastically subordinate to Bucharest.
The Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church did not approve of such a step and forbade the head of the “Bessarabians” Metropolitan Peter (Paduraru) to serve, although he did not cut off communication with the Romanian Church. Since then, there has been conflict in the republic on this basis. True, until recently it was smoldering.
In step with power
The situation worsened in February last year. Then the head of the PCM Metropolitan Vladimir (Kantaryan) did not make unequivocal statements about the position – his and the clergy’s – regarding Ukraine. Uncertainty plays to politicians’ advantage.
The government led by President Maia Sandu has always perceived the “Russian-controlled” structure as a threat to national security. Such words could often be heard addressed to her by Moldovan deputies: “heritage of the Russian world”, “agents of Russian influence”. At the same time, a leakage of personnel began – priests began to pass to Romanian jurisdiction.
This situation forced Metropolitan Vladimir to personally address Patriarch Kirill in September. The letter made headlines on the Internet. “Citizens’ trust in the church as an institution has fallen below the psychological threshold of 70%. And this is happening in a situation where the church has always topped the list of respondents’ trust with a score of almost 90%,” the bishop complained.
The reason for the fall, according to the hierarch, is that in the eyes of the citizens, the Chisinau Church is in solidarity with the position of the Russian Orthodox Church and the Kremlin regarding the Ukrainian conflict. But it is much more worrying that the Bessarabians took advantage of the crisis situation. She (the Bessarabian Metropolis), writes the head of the PCM, “has shown that she is a force that cannot be stopped and that she wants and will achieve her rights.”
The competitors really caught on to the pro-Romanian tendency of Sandu’s team and decided, as they say, to take the bull by the horns. In March, the president signed a law recognizing Romanian as the state language. At the end of June, the prime ministers of the neighboring countries visited each other. A month later, the Day of the Romanian National Anthem was celebrated in Chisinau. The celebrations were financed by the Romanian Department for Relations with the Republic of Moldova.
The same department previously concluded a cooperation agreement with the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Daniil. Among the signatories was unexpectedly the Bessarabian leader Metropolitan Petru (Paduraru). Later, his spiritual heritage officially announced its readiness to accept “all clergy and believers” under the jurisdiction of the Roman Catholic Church. And informs: “the decrees given by the PCM (the religious structure of the Russian affiliation) regarding the members of the Bessarabian Metropolis have no force.”
And on October 24, the Romanian Parliament adopted a bill according to which, from January 1, 2024, the Metropolitanate of the Romanian Orthodox Church in the country will receive two million euros per year from the country’s budget.
Political commitment
The Romanian structure also claims rights to several historical buildings in the center of Chisinau. One of them is the National Library. A bill for her return was submitted to parliament by deputies from the ruling Action and Solidarity party. According to the authors of the initiative, the transfer of the previous owner “will allow the restoration, preservation and use of the cultural heritage as intended”.
At the beginning of December, the officials of the Bessarabian Metropolis decided to take over no less than the cathedral of the city of Balti. They cited some evidence that the temple was previously Romanian. The local bishop of the PCM, Markel (Miheescu), immediately responded: the building is state property, which has been transferred for the use of the Moldovan metropolitan.
“I will not lower myself to such talks. They came here with whips and machine guns and forgot to leave,” he emphasized in a conversation with reporters.
This combination of circumstances led some Moldovan clergy to question whether an unauthorized transfer to another church (which is forbidden by the canons) would be a grave sin. The general mood was expressed in a letter to Metropolitan Vladimir from the rector of one of the capital’s churches, Archpriest Pavel Borshevsky – he proposed that the entire Moscow Orthodox Church sever relations with Moscow and join the RumPC as a single body.
The church in Moldova must be united, Borszewski said. But he added: united with the Romanian Church, not with the Bessarabian Metropolis. And here Paduraru and his companions began to worry. In this situation, two parallel dioceses will appear on the territory of the republic. And it is possible that they will have to give way to the more representative competitor from Bucharest.
According to theologian Roman Lunkin, the current transitions of Moldovan priests should not be seen as a signal for alarm. “I believe that these are largely biased decisions – caused by political changes. In addition, the government itself is actively fueling pro-Romanian sentiments in society,” he explains.
The purpose of this kind of “advertisement”, according to the expert, is the desire to destroy the Moldovan identity. Which in turn is inextricably linked with the church. That is why the PCM clergy suffered such a heavy blow. But, concludes Lunkin, radical changes should not be expected. The leadership of the Chisinau Metropolitanate still firmly maintains its canonical relationship with the ROC. And among the population there is still a strong spiritual and cultural connection with Russia.
Translation: V. Sergeev
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