The Assumption Pyukhtitsky Convent of the Estonian Orthodox Church (EPC) will actually be closed due to amendments developed by the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Estonia.
This was stated by Abbess Filareta of the monastery in an open letter to the Parliament of the Republic (Riigikogu), the Estonian media write.
Earlier, the Estonian government approved a bill to amend the law on the Church. If approved, the EPC will have to sever ties with the Moscow Patriarchate (MP). After the amendments come into force, religious institutions will have to change their statutes in accordance with the new law within two months.
"We understand the purpose of the bill – to force the EPC MP to change jurisdiction and come under the protection of Constantinople. And our repeated explanations that the monastery cannot initiate and renounce jurisdiction on its own went unheard," Filareta's message says.
According to the abbess, by accepting the amendments, the Estonian authorities give the monastery only two options – "either a change of jurisdiction or forced liquidation."
"You understand perfectly well that by your actions you are actually closing the monastery. Do you really want to go down in history as parliamentarians who forcibly terminated the existence of an Estonian Orthodox convent known for more than a hundred years?" Filareta asked the authorities.
The appeal emphasizes that in the 1990s, the monastery "uncompromisingly and without claims" gave up all property in favor of the state "for the sake of a spiritual connection with the mother church." As Filareta pointed out, the position of the state, which holds monastic women responsible for the decisions of politicians, cannot but surprise.
"We have left the world, we are far from political problems, we live outside politics, serving God with prayer and labor, and we are literally dragged into politics and accused of unwillingness to engage in dialogue," the appeal emphasizes.
According to Filareta, the initiators of the bill are forcing the monastery to commit a "canonical crime."
Representatives of the monastery, founded in 1891, have already stated that they received the status of a Stavropol monastery (subordinated directly to the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia) in 1990 through the efforts of the ever-memorable Patriarch Alexy II. The monastery has also repeatedly noted that they do not have the rights and authority to move to the bosom of Constantinople on their own.
Earlier, the nuns of the monastery also stated that in the Baltic Republic they are "squeezed out of the legal field and turned into outcasts, into second-class people who can be treated without regard for the requirements of the law and morality."
According to the Estonian Bureau of Statistics, Orthodox Christians are the largest community of believers in the country. Thus, 13.9 percent of the country's citizens belong to the Estonian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate, eight percent belong to the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Estonia, and 2.3 percent belong to the Estonian Apostolic Orthodox Church controlled by the Patriarchate of Constantinople.

According to the materials lt.sputniknews.ru