Primate of the UOC (MP) Metropolitan Onufriy “banned” three clerics of the Kyiv Diocese of the UOC (MP) who sided with their parishioners in joining the Orthodox Church of Ukraine.
The decree states that they were punished “for going into schism and violating the oath of a clergyman,” the Information and Education Department of the UOC (MP) reports.
The document states that priest Oleksiy Stepanov was dismissed from the post of head of the religious community of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the village of Dibrova in the Vasylkiv district of Kyiv region, Archimandrite Yaroslav (Alekseenko) and priest Volodymyr Shynkaruk were dismissed from their respective positions of the abbot and full-time priest in the church in honor of the holy prophet Elijah, Kalinivka village of the Vasylkiv district, Kyiv region.
In the decree signed off by Onufriy, it is noted that clerics are banned from priesthood “without the right to receive communion in the Holy Mysteries of Christ based on rules 10, 11, and 39 of the holy Apostles, the rule 2 of the Council of Antioch, for going into schism and grossly violating the oath of the clergyman.”
