Sergii Bortnyk took part at the round table “The restructuring of orthodox relations in light of autocephaly in Ukraine”

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On August 7., 2021, a round table “Restructuring of Orthodox Relations in light of autocephaly in Ukraine” was held at the University of Concordia (Canada). It took place within the framework of the Tenth World Congress of the International Council for Central and East European Studies (ICCEES) with the title “Bridging National and Global Perspectives”.

The Council is a global structure consisting of national associations of scholars engaged in multidisciplinary research in the field of Central and Eastern Europe, Russia and Central Asia. The speakers at the round table were scholars actively involved into the study of inter-Orthodox relations, including Petros Vassiliadis from Greece, Andrii Krawchuk from Canada and priest Cyril Hovorun from the United States.

The speakers held actual topics. In particular, Petros Vassiliadis spoke about “The Predicaments for Orthodox Ecclesiology of Its Negative Identity, and the New Era After Ukrainian Autocephaly”; Andrii Krawchuk’s topic was “The Reconfiguration of Orthodoxy in Ukraine and Geopolitical Challenges to Ecclesiastical Recognition”. The last was the report of Fr. Cyril Hovorun “The Ukrainian Cause: Panorthodox and Ecumenical Implications”. Sergei Chapnin, who was supposed to represent the Vrije University of Brussels, could not attend.

Sergii Bortnyk turned out to be the most active participant, asking the speakers several questions. In particular, they addressed the issue of increasing ethnophiletism in Ukraine as result of granting autocephaly to the “Orthodox Church of Ukraine” and the lack of effective repentance in the previous split on the part of the founders of the OCU at the time of its creation. These issues significantly revived the discussion.