Uniate ecumenism: church raiding means loving

October has been generous with the ecumenical initiatives of Greek Catholics, seasoned with church raiding.

In early October, the head of the UGCC Sviatoslav Shevchuk made a report at the Vatican on the ecumenical mission of the Eastern Catholic Churches. According to the website of the UGCC, he "presented the ecumenical activities of the UGCC and proposed concrete steps towards ecumenical dialogue".

From 5 to 7 October, the "Ecumenical Week" with the participation of representatives of various denominations was held in Lviv. The rector of the Ukrainian Catholic University welcomed the participants and noted that the main thing is "life in love".

On October 11, in Zaporozhie Uniates and Catholics discussed the creation of the Unified Local Church. The same meeting is planned in Zhitomir.

At all these meetings, they talked a lot about unity and unification. All in the spirit of the so-called "Ecumenical Conception of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church", which quotes Shevchuk's Pastoral Letter, entitled "A Living Parish – a Meeting Place with Living Christ" dated July 18, 2014: "In the spirit of Christ's love, we will try to avoid any statements or actions that might harm our brothers and sisters in Christ or offend them." We need to clarify – "brothers and sisters in Christ" also applies to the Orthodox.

Good and right ideas and words. If not for one "But". They absolutely do not match the facts.

On October 17, the so-called Coordination Council for the military chaplains of the UGCC in Kolomyia (Ivano-Frankivsk region -Ed.) decided not to allow its legitimate owners, the UOC community, into the church, to cordon off the temple and conduct its services near it.

This initiative was supported by the Uniate priests: Mikhail Dziuba (chaplain of the "Black Hundred", in fact, was the organizer of the seizure of the church), Nikolai Medinsky, Mikhail Arsenich, Yuri Atamaniuk, Vasily Dovganiuk, Nikolai Ostafiychuk and others.

However, they did not confine themselves to divine services near the church and its blockade, and later that night they cut the locks on the church doors, went inside and held their divine service there. That is, they took over the church with the support of right-wing radicals from the "Black Hundred".

On October 4, the court confirmed the rights of the UOC community to the temple but this did not stop the Greek Catholic chaplains. The police did not prevent them from doing so either. We wonder how such actions are combined with talks about ecumenism and interfaith peace.

It is not the first time the above-mentioned group of priests has been offensive to the UOC. If someone forgot, Michail Arsenich is the very priest who became famous for his xenophobic "preaching" at the monument to Bandera in 2010. Right-sector chaplain Nikolai Medinsky is known for his extremely aggressive rhetoric towards the UOC. And the others do not lag behind and in the spirit of "fraternal love" badmouth Orthodox believers in social networks.

Here are some examples of the "fraternal" attitude of the Uniates to the parishioners of the UOC:





Nikolai Medinsky already called participants of the Cross Procession in Kiev "Russian rot", just now he labelled the elderly parishioners "Moscow matryoshkas". In the video, the Uniate cleric is explaining to Orthodox believers the peculiarities of the canonical law of the Orthodox Church. I think the Orthodox will be surprised to learn that, in Medinsky's opinion, the Crete Council was held in Cyprus ... and "officially recognized the ROC as heretical"!

"The Moscow sect," "Putin's poodles," "fastidious, unwashed bearded bishops are an incomplete list of insults by Greek Catholic priests, to be named a few.

Why does the leadership of the UGCC turn a blind eye to such actions of its clergy and, as if nothing had happened, continues to talk with a smile about love, dialogue and unification?

Apparently, all the so-called ecumenical initiatives and statements are just an integral part of what is called PR. Western political culture accustomed to the fact that the leader of an organization must first of all talk a good game and be politically correct (in the Ukrainian version this point is often replaced by being "patriotic") and look the part. Behind this façade, it is easier to hide real goals and intentions. When the Orthodox openly criticize Catholics for heretical distortions of the Christian dogma – this is "closeness", "Russian world" and "obscurantism". When Uniates grab Orthodox churches and create parallel dioceses in the east of Ukraine, covering these actions with the talk about love, it is "ecumenism" and "restoration of justice".

If you carefully read the notorious "Ecumenical Conception", you can find out that Greek Catholics understand ecumenism as the accession of all Christians to the Catholic Church and recognition of the supremacy of the Pope. This is a rough substitution of concepts. What used to be called "conversion of schismatics" is now called by Greek Catholics ecumenical dialogue.

Uniates cannot but know that the Orthodox Church considers itself not just "Eastern Christianity," but the only true Church of Christ on earth. And from the Orthodox point of view, it is not they who should join the Roman Church, but the Roman Church should abandon the doctrine of the papacy and join Orthodoxy. Thus, the controversy surrounding the doctrine of the Church is central in the dialogue between Catholics and Orthodox Christians. There is not even a single word about this in the "Ecumenical Conception".

Why should the Orthodox enter into the dialogue the result of which the Uniates consider predetermined? Such a "dialogue" can be called Catholic propaganda, a mission or a sermon, but not a dialogue. In this respect, the Orthodox are simpler, they often say what they think without hiding behind the notion of ecumenism.

It is quite obvious that the UGCC does not need the real dialogue, because for this it is necessary to seriously consider the position of the Orthodox. All these meetings, statements about unity, etc. are used exclusively to impose its position and substitute concepts with the sole purpose – to spread its influence throughout Ukraine. The UGCC has long been trying to turn its confession from a marginal Western Ukrainian organization into an all-Ukrainian patriarchate, on the basis of which, they believe, the Unified Local Church will be created in the future.

In order to realize this plan, the Uniates, in particular, carry out systemic falsification of the history of Orthodoxy in Russia, which the head of the UGCC Sviatoslav Shevchuk openly declared at the recent so-called "scientific" meeting in the walls of the Sophia of Kiev. There Shevchuk said that the "Christian scientists" gathered to start a series of new "fundamental scientific research of all that we call the inheritance of the Kiev Church".

The head of the Uniates also said that 11 books had already been published on the subject. And that their "scientists" will not limit themselves to a purely historical aspect but will go further. They will study the theological aspect of the question, liturgics, sacred texts, church music and hymns, etc. That is, they will do the complete metamorphosis of the entire Ukrainian religious tradition for the sake of a certain historical and political ideology.

This ideology is directly stated in the already mentioned "Ecumenical Conception of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church". According to it, "the UGCC takes its historical time from the Church of ancient Kiev – the Kiev Metropolis of the Patriarchate of Constantinople, that is, from 988, when the Holy Equal-to-the-Apostles Prince Vladimir accepted Christianity as the official religion for the whole Rus-Ukraine. <...> One of the special features of the ecclesial life of the Kiev Church, which had a decisive influence on its identity and mission, was its openness to both the Christian East and the Christian West. <...> Recollection of the ecumenical communion of Churches in the memory of the Kiev Church could be temporarily forgotten (especially when it was deliberately obscured), but never completely disappeared. The understanding of the deep unity of the Church of Vladimir’s Baptism did not diminish in the church memory. Her God's people, although divided by confessional signs, still did not accept the division".

According to the Uniates, in 988 there was no Orthodox Church yet, and Rus accepted not the Orthodox, but a kind of "universal" Christianity from the supposedly unified Ecumenical Church. And when there was a division between the "Eastern" and "Western" Churches, the people of Rus allegedly did not accept this schism and for centuries tried to reunite!

Therefore, as they say, in the 16th century, "in the conditions of the internal crisis, the weakening of the Patriarchate of Constantinople ... the hierarchy of the Kiev Church ... decided to restore eucharistic communion with the Bishop of Rome".

The conception affirms that the Unia is the only direct successor of the Kiev Church because that part of the believers who wished to remain Orthodox "made parallel hierarchy (1620), unconnected with the Pope, and gained the official recognition of its separate jurisdiction (1632). <...>. Unfortunately, attempts to unite in XVII century connected with Rome and the unconnected parts of the Kiev Church in the one patriarchate could not be realized for a number of subjective and objective reasons, and since then, the unhealed wounds of division have remained on the body of the Kiev Church".

That is, the Orthodox broke away from the Kiev Church, and they are the ones who are responsible for "the wounds of division on Her body," the UGCC believes! While the Uniates continue to carry out a "noble" mission, that is, they are trying to join everyone to their Uniate patriarchate. This is ecumenism, from their point of view.

In this context, it is not surprising that the hierarchs of the UGCC overlook the aggressive actions of their representatives. For them, this is just one of the forms of "ecumenism," that is driving out Orthodoxy from Ukraine. Recently, Sviatoslav Shevchuk has openly declared that he considers Kievshchina (Kiev region – Ed.) "a historical territory" of the Uniates, and the UGCC – the true Kiev Church. That is, as in the case of the Kolomyia church, the Uniates claim for everything that once was in their hands for a while. In Western Ukraine, this is the Pochaev Lavra, and in Kiev, for example, – St. Sophia’s Cathedral!

In some way, history repeats itself. As well as 400 years ago, the Uniates actively torpedoed and drive out Orthodoxy, through deceit and the state. However, Orthodox believers should be comforted by the fact that at that time there were outstanding polemicists who, with their creations, exposed the falsified "ecumenism" of the Uniates. The Church will not remain defenseless now either.