Macedonian Orthodox worshippers will celebrate their second Easter this year since being unified with fellow believers in other Orthodox countries.
This must have come as a relief for North Macedonia’s churchgoers, as they are no longer considered schismatics thanks to Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew’s decision on May 9, 2022, which returned the Macedonian Orthodox Church (Ohrid Archbishopric), MOC-OA, to canonicity with the rest of Orthodoxy.
The landmark decision by Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew to accept the MOC-OA into communion lifted a great burden from its shoulders and opened many doors that had been closed for decades. The MOC-OA illegally seceded from the Serbian church in 1967 and fell into schism. Joint concelebrations and visits with other local church representatives have slowly become the norm, injecting fresh impetus into North Macedonia’s church life.
However, two years on, things have not been moving at the desired speed for MOC-OA’s autocephaly ambitions. Bartholomew, who sits in Istanbul and is considered first among equals, has still not signed the long-desired decree of autocephaly (tomos).
Branko Gjorgjevski, a Skopje-based church analyst, said that there were hopes that by now, the Ecumenical Patriarch would have issued the tomos. “Marking another anniversary without it means there is a big problem,” Gjorgjevski said.
Things got complicated with the speedy decision by Serbian Patriarch Porfirije on May 24, 2022, when he unilaterally granted autocephaly to the Macedonians, a right which the Ecumenical Patriarch considers to be reserved primarily to him.
The autocephaly granting process is still very much a contested issue. In the absence of an agreed-upon solution, tension exists between those who believe that only Constantinople can grant autocephaly and those who advocate the role of the “Mother Church” is to issue it and the rest to agree to it. The “Mother Church” in Orthodoxy is considered the local church from which a new, autocephalous church is created.
As a result, the validity of the Serbian-issued tomos is becoming increasingly questioned. While all the Orthodox churches accepted Bartholomew’s decision to return the MOC-OA into canonicity, to date only the Russian and the Bulgarian churches have recognised the Serbian-issued autocephaly. The Romanian church has announced that it recognises the MOC-OA’s autocephaly but will await the final decree from Istanbul. The church of Cyprus, Jerusalem and the Patriarchate of Alexandria have not expressed views on the matter, explains Marjan Nikolovski, editor of North Macedonia’s biggest religious news portal Religija.
A revelatory TV interview
Among those who openly dismiss the autocephaly granted by the Serbian church is Metropolitan Kyrillos of Imbros and Tenedos, a representative of the Ecumenical Patriarchate who has become a frequent guest of the Macedonian church. He gave a bombshell interview to North Macedonia’s popular news show ‘360 Degrees’.
“This will be a frank and open discussion” was the sentence he used to open the interview.
And indeed it was. The interview was unusually direct, with little held back, which represented a departure from the traditional diplomatic language that has previously been used.
Metropolitan Kyrillos attacked the Serbian-granted autocephaly, calling it a provocation by the Serbian church. “Unfortunately, the Serbs joined the Russian church, and they were directed to take this action; they provided a fake piece of paper which has no meaning. It is a fake tomos which no one recognises.”
“How is your church autocephalous? What has it done without asking first what Russia and Serbia think?” he asked.
MOC-OA did not comment on the hour-long interview. An unnamed source in the Synod told 24 Vesti that Metropolitan Kyrillos’s comments represent his opinion and do not entirely reflect the views of the Ecumenical Patriarchate.
Nikolovski said Metropolitan Kyrillos wanted to send two messages to the Macedonian public.
“The first one was that the MOC-OA’s autocephaly process is not yet complete and that there are still things the MOC-OA need to implement for the process to move forward. Failing to do so, the MOC-OA risks being trapped in the Russian backyard and used as a tool of Russian church interests,” he said.
The second message, according to Nikolovski, was that the Ecumenical Patriarchate’s representative wanted to directly address the remaining conditions for North Macedonia’s autocephaly.
“It is clear as day that the loaded questions that the Macedonian public has been preoccupied with regarding the loss of Macedonian identity and the MOC-OA’s independence are not on the table,” Nikolovski said.
Nikolovski insisted that “it is up to the MOC-OA to choose whether it will continue to protect Russian interests in Ukraine or it will choose to protect its own interests and resurrect the one thousand years history of the ancient Ohrid Archbishopric”.
Constantinople and Moscow battling for dominance
Unlike the Catholic Church, which is governed by one central figure in Rome, authority in the Orthodox world is dispersed. Many of the world’s Orthodox churches are de-facto national churches, led by patriarchs.
While the Patriarch of Constantinople enjoys theoretical primacy, much of the real power in the Orthodox world actually rests with the Patriarch of Moscow, as head of the world’s largest and richest Orthodox Church.
The quiet battle for supremacy between the two seats of power has only intensified over the past few years, observers say, with the Moscow Patriarchate, seen as a proponent of President Vladimir Putin’s interests, seeking to establish dominance over the other Slavic-speaking churches, and with Constantinople resting on the support of churches in the Greek-speaking sphere.
The last example of this conflict came when Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople in 2019 issued a tomos confirming the autocephaly of the newly-minted Orthodox Church of Ukraine, OCU, which became independent from the Moscow Patriarchate.
This caused a split in the Orthodox world. The Russian Church denounced what it saw as interference in its own jurisdiction. To many religious experts, it also signalled that Bartholomew was ready to stand up to Moscow in the power struggle in the Orthodox world. So far only three churches have recognised the OCU’s autocephaly: the Church of Greece, Cyprus and the Patriarchate of Alexandria.
Macedonian church pressed to take sides
Asked about the future of the discussions between Skopje and the Phanar (Bartholomew’s residence), Met. Kyrillos hinted that a recognition of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, OCU would be looked upon favourably.
Patriarch Kirill was the first to recognise MOC-OA’s autocephaly back in August 2022. The question of the church’s naming (that is, whether the word “Macedonia” should be used) is non-existent as the Russian church recognises the MOC-OA using its full name, therefore gaining sympathies in Skopje. If the MOC-OA decides to recognise the newly-founded church in Kyiv, it risks angering Kirill and shattering early relations.
While MOC-OA recognition of OCU would reopen the talks with the Phanar, it would not automatically lead to autocephaly as there are several remaining conditions still not fully resolved within the Macedonian church, such as the naming of the church and the issue of its diaspora. Bartholomew insists that he can only recognise the church in North Macedonia as the “Ohrid Archbishopric”, which the Macedonian public and some bishops react negatively to.
Autocephaly or stagnation – what’s next?
North Macedonia is holding presidential and parliamentary elections. The polls suggest a possible win for the centre-right VMRO DPMNE party. Asked about this, Gjorgjevski said that a victory for the VMRO DPMNE would “complement the already chosen trajectory of the MOC-OA, which is dictated by a few high-ranking bishops.”
He says the party’s campaigning has been focused on themes such as the return of the dignity and pride of the nation, which goes hand in hand with the narrative about the keeping of the full name of the MOC-OA.
“This will embolden certain bishops, and it will result in further delays and stagnation of the process for obtaining autocephaly from the Ecumenical Patriarch,” Gjorgjevski added.
The leader of the VMRO DPMNE, Hristijan Mickovski has commented in the past that only autocephaly issued by the Ecumenical Patriarchate is truly legitimate. His party has been one of the biggest opponents of the Prespa agreement signed in 2018, which ended the two-decades old name issue with Greece.
Any conversations about changing the name of the church will meet with difficulty, and risk locking the MOC-OA into the Russo-Serbian orbit.
Source: balkaninsight.com