Canonically this makes perfect sense. When will the other autocephalous Churches—especially the Moscow Patriarchate—renounce their extra-territorial dioceses and parishes and urge them to form proper, canonical, territorially demarcated Churches in every region around the globe? 

Metropolitan Epiphanius of Kyiv

The tomos on the autocephaly of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU) says that the central church of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU) will be located in Kyiv, the Church is not authorized to appoint bishops and establish parishes outside the country.

“With this signed patriarchal and synodal tomos, we recognize and proclaim the established autocephalous Church within Ukraine as our spiritual daughter and call upon all global Orthodox churches to recognize her as a sister… as such, which has the historical city of Kyiv as the [See] and cannot appoint bishops or establish parishes outside the state,” the text of Tomos, translated into Ukrainian, posted by the Ukrainian Ambassador to Turkey Andrii Sybiha in his Twitter account, says.

According to the document, the already existing parishes of the OCU [i.e., those outside of Ukraine that had belonged to the now defunct Kyiv Patriarchate (KP) or Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church (UAOC)] are now subject to the [Ecumenical] Throne, which has canonical powers in the diaspora, since “the jurisdiction of [the OCU] is limited to the territory of the Ukrainian state.”

The OCU gets privileges and all sovereign rights belonging to autocephalous church authority. As for the internal church administration, it is considered, judged and determined solely by the Metropolitan of Kyiv and All Ukraine and the Holy Synod.

“The Autocephalous Church of Ukraine recognizes the Most Holy Apostolic and Patriarchal Ecumenical Throne as the [See]… The Metropolitan of Kyiv and All Ukraine, as well as the hierarchs of the Most Holy Church of Ukraine, are now elected in accordance with the provisions of the divine and sacred canons and in accordance with the relevant provisions of its Charter, which must necessarily comply with the provisions of this patriarchal and synodal tomos,” the document says.

According to the tomos, in order to resolve “significant issues of a church, dogmatic or canonical nature,” the Metropolitan of Kyiv and All Ukraine should address the Ecumenical Throne on behalf of the Holy Synod of the OCU.

“Our Holy Christ [?] of the Great Church blesses and proclaims the autocephalous Orthodox Church of Ukraine,” the document says.

This brief report appeared on January 5, 2019 at Interfax-Ukraine. Our apologies for the awkward translation, as we have not seen the original at Orthodoxy in Dialogue.

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