Metropolitan Anthony: Church raiding undermines stability in Ukraine

Interfaith confrontation in Buderazh, May 11, 2019. Photo: UOJ

On August 5, 2019, the UOC Chancellor Metropolitan Anthony of Borispol and Brovary said in an interview with “Vesti” what the situation looks like six months after the signing of the Tomos.

Answering the question of what has changed for the UOC since the creation of the OCU, the bishop explained: “From the canonical point of view, nothing. Whatever attempts are being made to legalize the schism, it is still a schism, which, incidentally, is confirmed by the position of other Orthodox Churches that did not recognize the so-called OCU as a canonical church. From a practical point of view, no doubt, extremely negative influence was felt, alas. Indeed, with the filing and support of the previous government, the so-called OCU launched a large-scale raider attack against our Сhurch. Its result was the direct seizure of more than a hundred churches of the UOC, not to mention numerous cases of illegal re-registration of our communities to the jurisdiction of schismatics by local authorities.”

He also emphasized that new forms of pressure on believers of the UOC by local authorities have arisen in some regions.

“There is such a thing as “black registrar” – specialists who, under the Regional State Administration, illegally, on the basis of false and forged documents, re-register our communities to the jurisdiction of the OCU. New hotbeds of confrontation break out from time to time in different regions,” the bishop noted.

On the other hand, he said, “the schismatics also have had big problems. Their structure artificially tailored from different organizations and groups of influence did not stand the test of time. They have already had their own split – into the UOC-KP and the OCU. It got to the point that they are seizing temples from one another. No unification of Orthodoxy in Ukraine occurred after the Tomos. On the contrary, the schism even got worse. We warned Patriarch Bartholomew of this at that time, but he decided to go for the legalization of schismatics."

According to the hierarch, seizures of churches, violations of the rights of believers can end in failure: “You can’t compress a spring to its limit. God grant that certain people come to their senses and do not provoke more situations that can fuel the flame of great confrontation. We hope that now the laws will be respected again, and this will calm the situation in the religious sphere.”

The bishop believes that the new government should ensure the rule of law in the country: “Any power is elected by the people who are interested in ensuring their rights to be strictly observed. We hope that the new power, as I said, will return the rule of law to the sphere of the State-Church relations and put an end to raider attacks that undermine the stability of our state and society. Positive signals are visible now. God grant that they become more and more. Indeed, you must agree that it is strange if in a country looking towards Europe, violations of the principles and freedoms that European democracy is based on for centuries continue. I’m sure that the new government will not allow this.”

Metropolitan Anthony explained that the UOC hierarchy has no contact with the leadership of the OCU: “There is no contact since any contact implies trust. And how can we trust the other side if raider seizures of our temples and oppression of our believers are still ongoing? Is it possible to speak normally of something under, figuratively speaking, at gunpoint?”

As reported, earlier the UOC Chancellor Metropolitan Anthony (Pakanich) commented on the statement of President Vladimir Zelensky, who called on the Church for dialogue. “Of course, we are not against dialogue and have publicly stated this more than once. But any full-fledged dialogue can be built only on trust and the lack of desire of one of the parties to break their opponents through the knee,” the hierarch explained.

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