The ministry insists that the church move towards a final severance of ties with Moscow.
The Estonian interior minister says he will likely not approve the new name of the Estonian Orthodox Church, which has decided to amend its charter and remove references to the Moscow Patriarchate, ERR writes.
Interior Minister Lauri Läänemets noted that there are still areas that are of concern to the Estonian authorities.
“We have clear expectations that these are not cosmetic administrative changes, but serious steps to escape the influence of the Moscow Patriarchate,” the minister said.
Läänemets noted that the decision of the Estonian Orthodox Church cannot come into force until it is approved by the Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church Kirill.
“The name of a religious association must be clearly distinguishable from the names of other legal entities entered in the register and cannot be misleading, and, unfortunately, the new form of the name does not meet these requirements. Theoretically, the new form of the name could be acceptable if it, as an organization, united all Estonian Orthodox communities and Orthodox believers, but, in essence, it does not do this,” the head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs emphasized.
Lanemets is also unhappy with the fact that the head of the EOC remains Russian citizen Metropolitan Yevgeny, who was forced to leave Estonia, and says that he sees no reason to choose another head of the church. mention of ties with the Moscow Patriarchate.
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