WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 14th September, 2022) Archbishop of Montreal and Canada Gabriel (Chemodakov) expressed hope that the Russian Church Abroad (ROCOR) will continue keeping its Orthodox faith and traditions under the newly elected First Hierarch.
ROCOR Council of Bishops elected Bishop of Manhattan Nicholas (Olhovsky) earlier on Tuesday as the seventh First Hierarch in the church's over 100-year history. The position became vacant after the previous church primate Metropolitan Hilarion (Kapral) died in May.
"I would like to think that the newly chosen Metropolitan will continue the path of the ROCOR in keeping the faith, the traditions that were handed down to us by our fathers and grandfathers, by pillars of our Church and previous Metropolitans," Archbishop Gabriel told Sputnik.
He expressed the hope that the new Metropolitan will continue along this path, and that the ROCOR will not veer from those traditions.
Asked about the process of the voting for the First Hierarch, Gabriel noted that Bishop Nicholas was elected in the second round.
"In first round we had a vote and nobody got the necessary two-thirds of the votes. So, there was the second round of voting and then he got the most votes," Gabriel said.
After the election of the new primate, the Council will continue discussing other issues of church life, including possible replenishment of the episcopate, he added.
