The head of the Legal Department of the UOC, Archpriest Alexander Bakhov, in an interview with the editorial office of the Information and Educational Department, told why the persons who carried out the religious examination of the Charter on the management of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church should be held criminally liable for high treason, and also why this examination is illegal and how The Ukrainian Orthodox Church will defend its right to exist and freedom of religion.
Archpriest Alexander noted that the examination of the SSUEFC is “illegal, because as a result, the experts arbitrarily changed the subject and object of the study, referring to the Internet resources of the aggressor country, resorting to manipulation, created the prerequisites for the split of Ukrainian society along religious lines, which in turn creates prerequisites for justifying military aggression against Ukraine. In this regard, I believe that they should be prosecuted for high treason.”
The head of the legal department noted that “this cannot be called the conclusion of a religious expertise. It cannot be called expertise at all. This is a certain interpretation of scientists from the field of philosophy and history of their vision and presentation of the church-canonical connection in the charter on the management of the UOC. In general, reading that conclusion, I get the impression that they were given instructions from Russia, and the charter of the Russian Orthodox Church became the subject of the study. By the way, this religious studies conclusion is very similar to the previous one, which was made in 2019, during the time of Mr. Yurash – there is also a lot of the ROC website and a lot of such links.”
“In accordance with Art. 19 of the Constitution of Ukraine, public authorities and their officials are obliged to act within the limits of the Constitution and laws of Ukraine. And in this case, what do we have? The SSUEFC provides a religious expertise, that is, it has the right to conduct this religious expertise, but there is no mechanism for exercising this right, there is no provision, there is no methodology for conducting this religious expertise, criteria for selecting experts, evaluation, responsibility, and so on. Therefore, based on this, we come to the conclusion that this religious expertise is illegal, because its conduct is not provided for by any regulatory legal act,” Father Alexander noted.
He also drew attention to the fact that the experts “could not give a definition of the main element – the church-canonical connection. This definition is absent in the scientific literature, it is absent in the legislation, and it is not clear what the experts put into this understanding – that there is a church-canonical connection for them. For example, is it possible to consider baptism in the Russian Orthodox Church during the Soviet era or the receipt of the corresponding priestly consecration as a church-canonical connection? Is there a church-canonical connection here or is it not, and what does it consist of?
“They started with the fact that the purpose of the study is to establish a church-canonical connection, and then moved on to dependence / independence, autocephaly / non-autocephaly. That is, the terms are constantly changing. Thus, the subject of research is shifting,” the priest added.
Archpriest Alexander Bakhov is convinced that under martial law it is unacceptable to be guided by the documents of a country that is carrying out aggression against Ukraine, and, moreover, it is a crime, because the enemy can use it to mislead, to create certain public unrest, in including on religious grounds. Therefore, you need to be very careful here.
“Moreover, there is a question about the quality of the documents they examined. Why are they sure that the information posted on the ROC website is reliable?” the lawyer said.
Father Alexander noted that the aforementioned religious expertise is “one of the ways to fight against the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. We see that in recent times, pressure has been actively exerted on the UOC, searches are being carried out, sanctions are applied to religious figures, and we also see a huge number of bills that are aimed at banning the UOC. By the way, another bill was registered yesterday (it will already be the 9th bill), which is aimed at making the activity of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church impossible. Therefore, in this case, the UOC defends its right to exist and its right to freedom of religion, and we will defend our right by all legal means, both at the national and international levels.”
“We are not defending our connection with the MP, we are defending our right to be the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, we are defending our right to pray in the Church where we are. This is guaranteed to us by the Constitution and this is guaranteed to us by international legal acts, this is guaranteed to us by the right to freedom of religion, and no one has the right to forbid us to do this. Although, you should pay attention to the fact that our opponents have changed their rhetoric and are already saying: “We do not want to ban you. No, we do not ban you,” but all their actions are aimed at making the activities of the UOC impossible, and this is tantamount to a ban,” summed up the head of the Legal Department of the UOC.
