Entry into local church will be voluntary – Klimkin

16:02, 11.10.2018 1 min read

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin has assured that the believers will independently determine which patriarchate their parish will belong to.

"Entry into the local church will be entirely voluntary. Neither state bodies, nor church hierarchs, but the parishioners themselves of each parish will determine which patriarchate they will belong to," the minister wrote in his blog posted on the Ukrainian Pravda online edition on Thursday .

Klimkin added that today Ukraine needs new feuds and strife the least.

"We must take care first of all about people, about believers, to whatever patriarchy they belong to, about peace and harmony in our common home," the head of the foreign ministry stressed.

In his opinion, only consolidated local autocephalous Ukrainian Orthodox Church can provide such peace and harmony and put an end to the problems of the past.