There are people within the Estonian Christian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate, LF) who are prepared to sever ties with Moscow. But they fear the reaction of the church leadership.

Estonian scholar and professor of international law Evhen Tsybulenko said this in an interview with LF.

According to him, there are different groups within the Moscow Patriarchate church.

“There are the most hard-line supporters of maintaining ties with the Moscow Patriarchate. This is particularly evident in structures directly subordinate to Moscow, the Pyukhtitsa Monastery and the Aleksandr Nevsky Cathedral.

There are pragmatists who understand that they need to comply with Estonian law and look for possible solutions.

Finally, there is a kind of quiet opposition, people who consider a move to the Patriarchate of Constantinople a perfectly normal option. But they fear the reaction of the church leadership and rarely speak about it publicly,” the scholar said.

According to him, it will soon become clear which of these groups predominates.

“The actual balance among these groups will become much clearer after December 28, when individual parishes will have to make decisions: maintain their previous position and litigate, leave Russian jurisdiction, move under the Patriarchate of Constantinople, or create another model that complies with the law,” Evhen Tsybulenko stressed.