Getting rid of paternalism is a prerequisite of the one Local Orthodox Church, UGCC head

“That's why we, on the one hand, work and pray for unity between churches and on the other hand we declare the need for freedom of the Church and partnerships with our Ukrainian state,” said the patriarch.

Unification of the Churches is impossible without religious freedom. A necessary element of religious freedom is the church-state partner relations. Whenever a state, even our own, wants to use the church for their political goals, it commits violence over it. The principle of non-interference into the church life is a prerequisite for its development.

Patriarch Sviatoslav told about this in his sermon on April 13, 2015, the patronal feast of the UGCC Patriarchal Cathedral of Resurrection in Kyiv, according to the Information Department of the UGCC.

According to the hierarch of the UGCC, getting rid of from state paternalism is a prerequisite for building a local church in Ukraine. "Otherwise, every church unity that comes from the outside, which is designed in any public office, is not helpful but generates new divisions,” stresses the patriarch.

“That's why we, on the one hand, work and pray for unity between churches and on the other hand we declare the need for freedom of the Church and partnerships with our Ukrainian state,” said the patriarch.

After the sermon patriarch called on to pray for unity between all the heirs of Volodymyr's baptism: “Let us pray and build one local church in Ukraine.”