Embassy in Slovenia no longer thinks that OCU concelebrated with a Catholic
The Embassy and Ambassador of Ukraine to Slovenia removed from publications about the OCU’s first service in this country the mention of concelebrating with a Catholic.
On March 31, 2019, on the Facebook pages of the Embassy of Ukraine in Slovenia, as well as the personal page of Ambassador Mykhailo Brodovych, there appeared publications describing the first service of the OCU in Slovenia. The UOJ and other news resources based their reports on the event, which appeared on the morning of April 1, on the information provided by the Ukrainian diplomats. The text of the publication of the Embassy, in particular, said: “The service was headed by Archpriest Fr. Vasily Kuchirka concelebrated by the Slovenian priest Fr. Alesh Tomašević."
However, around 2 pm, the representatives of the Embassy made changes to the official text of the publications, which the diplomats did not consider necessary to report publicly. Now the mentioned fragment sounds different: “The service was conducted by Archpriest Fr. Vasily Kuchirka and attended by the local priest Fr. Alesh Tomašević, who addressed the public with the words of welcome.”
Due to these changes, some resources rushed to blame the UOJ for false information. In particular, the site “Cerkvarium”, which appeared in the summer of 2018 at the height of the pro-Tomos campaign of the authorities and conducts its activity in the relevant line, stated that “the news from the UOJ does not correspond to the reality regarding concelebration”. As evidence of this thesis, the authors referred to an updated version of the publication of the Ukrainian diplomats to Slovenia, which did not mention the concelebration. The resource also reports that Catholic priest Alesh Tomašević was at the service only in a cassock-alb, that is in the vestment “not suitable” for ministry, and the charter of the Roman Church does not approve of this: “Under certain conditions, priests who will concelebrate can concelebrate in a cassock-alb and a stole, but the charter does not welcome this.”
As a result, the authors argue that there was no concelebration, the UOJ "misinterpreted the reality" and concluded: "Cerkvarium regards this fake from the UOJ as a conscious discredit of the Ukrainian autocephaly."
We recall that a video is attached to the publication of the UOJ where it is clearly seen that the Catholic priest is not just present among the worshipers but during the whole service is near the OCU cleric Vasily Kuchirka in front of the throne and behind the throne, communicating with Kuchirka, and is obviously taking part in the ministry, that is concelebrating him.
Earlier, on March 19, the Embassy of Ukraine, together with the Society of Ukrainians in Slovenia, published an announcement of the service, which also said: “The service will be headed by Archpriest Vasily Kuchirka, concelebrated by the local priest Fr. Alesh Tomašević. This publication has not yet been corrected.
