The constitution of our state guarantees freedom of speech, assembly and religion. It protects the rights of believers and clearly says that a person is free to choose which Church to belong to and which religion to profess. However, the prescribed laws of the Constitution for some of the Ukrainian officials, unfortunately, do not have the proper meaning, writes the head of the Representation of the UOC to European International Organizations, Bishop Viktor (Kotsaba) of Baryshevsky, commenting on the protest action of the believers of the dioceses of the UOC of illegal re-registration in the OCU of the communities of the UOC by officials of the Vinnytsia Regional State Administration.

Commenting on the actions of officials, Bishop Victor writes: “They give preference not to this fundamental document, but to their personal convictions about the rights and freedoms of Ukrainian citizens. Based not on the main law of the country, but on their own preferences, such officials decide at their own discretion which Church” more correct “and which Church can and which cannot exist within our state. That is why the believers of the UOC are forced to remind the people’s deputies and other representatives of state power about their constitutional rights.

Such actions of those in power are not only illegal, but also against the people, because they only intensify the confrontation that already exists in Ukrainian society. A patriot is a person who works for the good of the state, and not to the detriment of it. And the incitement of religious hatred, which we are witnessing now in these villages of the Vinnytsia region, is an absolute harm to Ukraine. Those who hold power today must look for common ground, not division as never before. “