The diocesan court of the Moscow diocese deprived Archpriest Alexei Uminsky of his ecclesiastical rank. A message about this was posted on the diocese's website.
According to the diocese, the priest did not come to the meetings on January 11 and 12, and therefore today, according to the rules of the church court, the decision was made in his absence. Previously, Uminsky was removed from the rectorship of the Church of the Holy Trinity in Khokhly, where he had served since 1993, and was banned from serving.
The archpriest was accused of refusing to read a special prayer of Patriarch Kirill after the outbreak of the war in Ukraine in support of the Russian military.
In this “prayer for Holy Rus'” and its “united people” there are the words: “Soldiers and all defenders of our Fatherland in Your commandments, bestow strength of spirit upon them, preserve them from death, wounds and captivity!”
Representatives of the Moscow diocese considered that this falls under the 25th rule of the Holy Apostles. It involves defrocking for “fornication, perjury or theft.”
The Rule emphasizes that those subjected to such punishment should not be excommunicated from the church, “for the scripture says: Thou shalt not avenge one thing twice.”
The decision to defrock a priest will come into force after how Patriarch Kirill approves it.
Alexey Uminsky is widely known for his independent public position. In 2021, he called on the authorities to show mercy to Alexei Navalny and allow doctors to work as a politician. In 2019, the priest came to court for the sentencing of the defendant in the “Moscow case” Yegor Zhukov, and in 2022 he visited Vladimir Kara-Murza in the pre-trial detention center.
Updated at 16:02. The news added a link to a message from the Moscow diocese and the grounds on which the church court defrocked the priest.