Pope and Patriarch Theodore II of Alexandria and All Africa referred to the “predatory and disrespectful” conduct of the Russian Church and the “seizure of parish communities of native Orthodox Christians” through the temptation to bribe their priests, in an encyclical issued on Monday, May 9, and addressed to the Metropolitans and the Bishops of the Alexandrian Throne.
Patriarch Theodore urged the Metropolitans and Bishops to take any action provided for by local law to safeguard the movable and immovable property of the ecclesiastical Provinces, but also to immediately restore any property to the legal possession of their Legal Entity (Metropolises and Bishops) by any trespasser.
Moreover, the Patriarch of Alexandria and All Africa made special reference to the management of the issue of the separatist clergy, while finally, he called on the Metropolitans and Bishops to stand “with a pure Orthodox sacrificial spirit, boldness and courage against the anti-Christian “ecclesiastical” (!) expansionism”.
