Metropolitan Nikodim of Zhytomyr and Novograd-Volynsky spoke about how anti-church stereotypes are formed against the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. Today, he said, against the backdrop of a bloody war, they are trying to engage in raiding, seizures that divide the people, and not a single nation can defeat the occupier when it is divided inside.
“There are canons for which we cannot go. There should be a dialogue with everyone, but first of all, we need to stop the strife, stop the attacks, no one forbids building, restoring, but not setting people up. What a pain in my heart – for my priests, who have never been to Russia, they were born here by Ukrainian mothers, they are called “Moscow”.
As soon as this war began, our flock, our parishioners, our soldiers went to the front line to give their lives. We were told, “you don’t bury, you don’t want to,” you know, our UOC is burying, it’s just that there are such moments, of a political nature, funding or something else, “don’t go there, because you won’t be compensated, you’ll be on your own, go, bury.” In the villages, everywhere our soldiers are buried by our Church.
Our warriors come to us, we bless them for protection. Our mothers send their sons to the front line and pray. Already more than 2,000 warriors – a list that we pray every day. They began to intimidate us – “soldiers will return from the front line, they will show you!”. But for them, faith is important today. And they do not ask what language they speak and what church they attend. And as our President said, if it were not for the eastern cities, where would the Russian Federation be today? If not for our Church, where would our people be?
God grant that they return unscathed, but some people use these moments while they are there, and one is afraid to show himself at the front, but he needs to show himself, to earn political dividends for himself. So they raise this issue of the Church. Who is raising this issue today? Those who are afraid,” said Metropolitan Nikodim.
The Metropolitan of the UOC also explained why the changes to the Charter were adopted.
