Ukrainian prelate raps Moscow patriarchate for failure to condemn Russian aggression in Crimea
April 02, 2014
Catholic World Report has provided a translation of an interview in which Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, the leader of the Ukrainian Catholic Church, speaks of the role that Church has played during the recent political upheaval in Ukraine, and criticizes the Russian Orthodox Church for its failure to condemn the Russian usurpation of Crimea.
The silence of the Moscow patriarchate is “the sign of a definite weakness,” the Ukrainian prelate says. “For whenever the Church finds herself unusually close to a specific governmental institution, whenever harmonious state-church relations turn into a sort of domination of one by the other, then, obviously, the Church becomes incapable of speaking the truth in all its fullness in specific historical circumstances. And therefore I think that this is exactly what we are seeing now.”
Patriarch Filaret, the Ukrainian Orthodox leader who broke with Moscow after the independence of Ukraine, has condemned the Russian move into Crimea. “Our response is similar,” Major Archbishop Shevhcuk says.
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