160 priests from their churches and monasteries, representatives said Friday, February 9.
The Alternate Synod does not recognize the leadership of Patriarch Maxim, who was appointed as the head of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church under the Communist regime in the 1970’s.
The group was forced out of their churches on July 21, 2004, after the State Prosecutor decreed that their churches and monasteries should be turned over to the segment of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church under Patriarch Maxim.
Police carried out the expulsion in a coordinated action across the country. A number of priests and laypeople were reportedly beaten in that process.
PRIEST EXPULSIONS
"Since the expulsions the priests have been forced to hold services for their congregations in the open air which, over the winter, means freezing temperatures, snow and rain," said Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW), an advocacy group supporting them, in a statement to BosNewsLife.
During their February 12-15 visit to Strasbourg two key Synod members, Bishop Kiril Kostantiiski and Priest Jordan Kirilov Lesov will be calling on European parliamentarians to pressure on Bulgaria to end what they see as injustice.
The bishop and priest have been "forced to subsist on charity of friends and members of their congregations since the loss of their churches in July 2004," said CSW.
While they supported Bulgaria ’s entry into the European Union on January 1, the two church leaders were to raise concerns that the European Union has not pushed for "a just resolution" to these apparent contraventions of religious freedom. Countries are required to meet European human rights standards as part of the accession process.
HUMAN RIGHTS COURT
The case is currently being considered by the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. Speaking to BosNewsLife in Budapest, the Bulgarian ambassador to Hungary, Dimiter Ikonomov, said his country respects different religions. As an example he mentioned the many Turkish people who fled Bulgaria in the late 1980s.
"In Communist tradition, the regime tried to blame the difficulties on an ‘internal enemy.’ About 300,000 Turkish people were forced to flee the country. But I am happy that at least one-third of them have now come back." He said it was a sign that the government encourages different faiths to operate in the country.
Yet, in remarks obtained by BosNewsLife, the expelled church leaders’ lawyer, Latchezar Popov, said the case "highlights a continuing lack of the rule of law in Bulgaria."
He said it was the Prosecutor’s Office which gave an order to the police to carry out the seizures rather than a court decision. Popov said it is "highly unusual in any legal system for a prosecutor’s office" to issue such a "unilateral order with no court decision to back it up."
"DEEPLY CONCERNED"
CSW National Director Stuart Windsor told BosNewsLife that his group continues to be "deeply concerned for the welfare of these priests," many of whom "are living in extremely precarious circumstances after having been deprived of their livelihood and vocation by the Bulgarian government."
He described as a "blatant violation of religious freedom" what has taken place in the new EU member state.
"We urge members of the European Parliament to take up this issue with the European Commission and with the Bulgarian government and call upon the Bulgarian government to address this issue in a just manner, in line with their human rights obligations as a full member of the EU," Windsor said. (with BosNewsLife reporting from Budapest. bosnewslife.com)
