Council of Churches asks to offer prayers for family values from Friday to Sunday

This is reported by the UGCC Information Department.

The AUCCRO asks believers of different religions and confessions for a common prayer for the preservation of the family in Ukraine – a prayer from Friday, September 17, to Sunday, September 19, inclusive.

"We believe that the Lord will hear our prayer call and the hybrid attack against the family will be stopped," the statement signed by the head of the UGCC, Patriarch Sviatoslav, who is currently presiding over the Council of Churches, reads.

"The current challenges of our time that our long-suffering people face force us to raise our voice again and again in their defense − in defense of the very foundation of our existence, our identity, tradition and culture," the AUCCRO said in a statement.

The appeal says that it was the family that has always been the center of freedom for Ukrainians, in which even in the most difficult times the national identity was preserved – language, culture, religion, traditions:

"In all the centuries of our national existence, the basis of the social structure of the people was the family (family). Despite the various tyrannical and totalitarian systems that reigned in our open spaces, the family served as the center of freedom and love that did not allow the national consciousness, language, culture, religion and good traditions to decline. Created and blessed by the Almighty, this first human community continues to fulfill its majestic mission – to be the main place where human life boils, develops and flourishes in all its personal, family and national multiplicity and beauty."

In the modern world, the family as a social institution is experiencing powerful attacks of new gender ideologies of the totalitarian type – ideologies that threaten the very existence of the family, level its essence and values, which are based on respect for human dignity and human life from conception to natural death. In Ukraine, these global challenges have the character of systematic attacks aimed at destroying traditional values, family and moral foundations – that is, at ensuring that Ukrainians were able to survive as a people and nation.

"Unfortunately, in the XXI century, the Ukrainian family faced challenges of a new gender ideology of totalitarian type, which threatens the very existence of the family as a union of fruitful and faithful love between a man and a woman, and eliminates all the positive achievements of the family way of life of our people and their values. These include equality in dignity and the uniqueness and peculiarity of the vocation of men and women, education of relations to the ability to marry and perceive the gift of the birth of a new life, respect for the dignity of each person and the protection of human life from conception to natural death, family solidarity and mutual assistance of generations, respect for parents and elders, respect for the rights of the child, the inadmissibility of domestic violence and harassment, etc.

We are all witnessing how today they are trying in every possible way to denigrate everything that concerns the family values of the Ukrainian people cherished over the centuries, calling them stereotypes, equating gender only with a social role, which, according to the latest ideologists, should be eliminated. We see each time a clearer juxtaposition of traditional family and European values, which is nothing more than a cynical substitution of concepts and a planned attack on the European choice of our people. Public provocations against public morals are increasingly being organized in different cities of Ukraine, which are most likely part of the systematic destruction of the moral health of our people. These measures are part of a strategy that aims to gradually impose on us a perception of human sexuality and family life that has never been inherent in Ukraine. At the same time, there are even threats of criminal prosecution of dissidents," the AUCCRO said in a statement.

Religious figures warn all believers against any violent actions in response to provocations and call for defending their rights as law-abiding citizens in a free country. Religious leaders ask believers of all religions and faiths to pray together for three days in support of family values and initiatives to protect them.

"In the face of these latest dangers, we warn all believers against any violent actions and the use of hate speech to defend our beliefs. Instead, we urge you to actively use your civil rights and, as law-abiding people in a free country, give examples of exemplary family life, thereby popularizing its beauty and divine perfection and capturing modern people with evidence of the joy of family life and the radiance of the life wisdom of entire generations.

We feel pain in the hearts of many loyal sons and daughters of Ukraine and ask them to confirm their beliefs in the most appropriate and responsible way – by praying for the preservation of family and Ukraine, starting Friday, September 17, through Sunday, September 19 (inclusive). We believe that the Lord will hear our prayer call and this hybrid attack against the family will be stopped," the religious leaders urge.