An employee of the Department for External Church Relations of the UOC, Professor of the Kiev Theological Academy and Seminary Serhiy Bortnik, in an interview with the Dialogue.TUT portal, noted that the Ukrainian state “is trying to turn the UOC into a church under its control,” and considers “the destruction of church structures and the absorption of parishes by our opponents” as an alternative – OCU”.
“It must be admitted that within the UOC we see a certain support for the ideas of the “Russian world.” In particular, in practical terms, there are individual sympathizers of Russian imperial greatness who have already been convicted of crimes of collaborationism. But in a situation where searches and “talks” of law enforcement officers bodies with representatives of the UOC are counted by hundreds, there are very few actual convictions,” he added.
According to the professor, “in this matter, the intention of powerful international church institutions – the WCC and the See of Rome – turn out to be close to what the top leadership of the UOC seeks to convey. The nature of the Church is not of this world. It must have its own voice, its own program of action, its own vision, all the more so in a situation of powerful challenges, which is the ongoing brutal war.”
“I am convinced that in her sermon the Church should put Christ at the center and evaluate various aspects of the current war from an evangelical perspective,” stressed Sergei Bortnik.
