UOC hierarch: Our Church will survive both this war and this pressure

Metropolitan Theodosy (Snigirev) of Cherkasy and Kaniv commented for the UOJ on the reported preparation by Phanar of a new church structure in Ukraine.

“Divide and rule – this ancient principle is still exploited today by the eternal enemy of the Church of Christ under a commonly good pretext. However, these armchair strategists, who suggest that believers in Ukraine now come under the direct subordination of Patriarch Bartholomew, are again mistaken about our believers, just like they were mistaken in 2019, the UOC hierarch believes. “They still have not realized that our Church lives according to completely different laws, not according to the laws they are used to living by. The idea of dividing and destroying the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, taking advantage of wartime, is doomed to failure from the very beginning.”

The Metropolitan recalled that the UOC is the true and only canonical Church in the territory of modern Ukraine. This means that its believers are under the protection of the Savior.

“We are under God's special care and attention being our main and absolute advantage. Using this advantage, the Church of Christ survived Nero and Diocletian, passed through the periods of empires, survived under the Bolsheviks and the Soviets. There is no doubt that our Church will survive this war, this time, and this pressure. The hearts and hopes of the majority of UOC believers have always been turned primarily to eternity, rather than the earth, unlike our ‘confessional opponents’. That is why the overwhelming majority of our faithful are not as susceptible to the influences of earthly events and cataclysms as representatives of other ‘church’ structures. The one who hopes in God, who thinks about eternity, sees everything differently. Therefore, our Church is protected by the Lord. Those fighting with us cannot understand it. How many times we have we been told, ‘It’s a matter of short time before you disappear.’ Even in the last 30 years, we have heard this several times. Moreover, the Soviet leader Khrushchev once promised to show the last priest on TV. It would have been so, if it were not for God being our Guardian and Provider,” recalled the hierarch of the UOC.

Vladyka expressed regret that not everyone understands this now. In times of general stress, not everyone realizes this spiritual law, both among the persecutors and among the ‘tottering’ members of the Church. Many are in a panic because of earthly events, because of fiery trials, while others take advantage of it.

“Now the war has begun to clearly reveal the previously hidden qualities of people, including those of the clergy, both good and bad,” the Metropolitan of the UOC believes. “Faithful to their Church, priests and laity rallied even stronger during the war. Those who are weaker panicked and staggered. Those who had a ‘double bottom’, rottenness, are now taking off their sheep guise. The war revealed the innermost in people. But the war will definitely end. However, what came out of man can't hide back. This, perhaps, can be washed away only by deep and sincere repentance. Anyway, our Church will definitely survive despite the new overvalued ideas of near-church strategists.”

“The main task today for us, faithful bishops, priests and laity, is to support the weak, protect the staggering, protect the fallen in spirit. God is with us, brothers,” Metropolitan Theodosy of Cherkasy and Kaniv supported the faithful of the UOC.

Recall that the UOJ found out that the Patriarchate of Constantinople had decided to secretly create in Ukraine another church jurisdiction, separated from both the Russian Orthodox Church and the OCU. Its task is to attract those priests who, on the one hand, do not consider it possible for themselves to continue to remain under the jurisdiction of the ROC, but on the other hand, do not want to unite with the OCU.