DECR: Glavсom's accusations against UOC are false and far-fetched
The deputy head of the DECR said that the denomination, which is not allowed to open parishes abroad, may be behind the slander about the UOC's foreign parishes.
Archpriest Mykola Danilevych commented on an article published on the “Glavсom” website in which the UOC was accused of "discrediting Ukraine on the international arena" due to the opening of parishes abroad.
Archpriest Mykola Danilevych said in his article posted on the DECR website that the UOC is conducting its mission abroad independently, without influence or coordination with Moscow.
According to him, among the believers who left the country at the beginning of the war, there is a request to create new parishes of the UOC:
"People themselves ask us, because they do not want to go either to the ROC or the ROCOR for well-known reasons, also they do not go either to the OCU or to the UGCC. The UOC leads its foreign missions entirely independently without any influence or coordination with Moscow. As a result, in these activities, we even face resistance from the ROC. <...> Thus, we open UOC communities abroad not thanks to but against the wishes of the ROC. Where is 'discrediting Ukraine' here, as it is written in the mentioned article?” said the deputy head of the Department for External Church Relations of the UOC.
At the same time, Archpriest Mykola called "low" statements of the media that he allegedly is a citizen of Russia and maintains "close relations with the leaders of the ROC DECR.
The priest stressed that all these accusations were long ago refuted and the story about Russian citizenship is nothing more than a fake.
"The image of 'traitor' or 'enemy' shouldn’t be artificially made of me. It doesn't stick. Everyone in the Church has long known me and my position. Loyalty to the country, as well as faithfulness to the Church, is among the basic principles of my life. <...> Thus, the accusations cited in the Glavcom article are false and far-fetched. The article gives a distorted picture of the activities of the UOC abroad that does not correspond to reality.”
The deputy head of the DECR believes that defamatory publication in the media can be written in the interests of a third party.
"I assume that behind these accusations of me personally and attacks against the activities of our Church in the diaspora may be the sympathizers of one confession, which according to its basic document does not have the right to directly open communities abroad and thus, perhaps, through law enforcement agencies is trying to create obstacles to us," the priest wrote.
As reported, a meeting of the Western European clergy of the UOC was held in Milan.
