Even non-Russian believers look up more to the Russian patriarch than the one in Constantinople/Istanbul -- historically a captive of the Turks
A year ago I wrote about a huge PEW opinion poll of religious belief in Eastern Europe.
As it happens, one of the questions dealt with the question of which Patriarch the Orthodox believers of each country consider to be the highest authority in Orthodoxy.
There is a grand total of one country where EP is considered to be the highest authority of Orthodoxy (Greece), and only a couple where it has a clear lead over ROC (Greece and Romania).
Strictly speaking, the Greeks are correct. The four ancient Churches do have the highest authority by dint of their antiquity, but this precedence is symbolic and does not absolve them of the responsibility to act in a conciliar spirit.
This confirms my point that Bart’s position on the Ukrainian schismatics does not conform to ecclesiastical reality, to demographic reality, or to the reality of global Orthodox opinion. It is not ROC that is going to get isolated.
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