"Ukraine: tasks for building peace" is the theme of the scientific conference, which was held on May 23 in Milan (Italy). The event was initiated by the Ambrosianeum Foundation in cooperation with the Catholic University and the Archdiocese of Milan. In the speech eh delivered online, the head of the UGCC spoke about the crimes of the Russian army in Ukraine and called them genocide of the Ukrainian people.
Source: UGCC Information Department
The war in Ukraine raises an important question for everyone: why? When we see bullying of the civilian population, sexual violence against women, men and children, mass graves with hundreds of innocent children and their parents murdered, bodies scattered on the streets of our cities, a humanitarian catastrophe, deportations – each of us asks ourselves again and again: why?".
The Head of the UGCC is confident that a real genocide of the Ukrainian people is evolving. This is evidenced by the manifesto of the Russian Nazism published on the website of RIA Novosti, where "the first paragraph says that Ukrainians as a nation do not exist, that Ukrainians are Russians who believed that they are Ukrainians. There is no Ukrainian history, language, or culture." "As a people, we were condemned to destruction," His Beatitude Sviatoslav concluded.
"It is even more difficult to perceive Christian justification for such crimes," the head of the UGCC stressed, when "the patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church not only blesses but also justifies the actions of the Russian army in Ukraine. Christian evangelism is instrumentalized for the purpose of ideological propaganda of Russian Nazism. We see this ideology moving closer and closer to the ISIS doctrine of the Islamic State. The same arguments are used, although they are clothed in Christian vestments. We hear about a metaphysical war against Universal globalism, and then the Ukrainian people, who are under the influence of the morally degraded West, presented as the Antichrist. That is, a Ukrainian is one who carries the seeds of the Antichrist and therefore needs to be killed."
Another phenomenon of this war, according to His Beatitude Sviatoslav, is "the use of sexual violence as a weapon. Hundreds of cases of raped women, children, men… A typical feature of sexual crimes is that they are mostly committed in public. This is done in order to completely humiliate the victim, and show others the measure of punishment for showing disobedience. Russian soldiers receive not only permission but also orders to commit this kind of crime."
All these facts reveal the true face of the Russian World ideology. "We are talking about religious fundamentalism of a totalitarian nature, to which we are a victim," the head of the UGCC stressed.
"As a church, we will continue to heal these physical, psychological and spiritual wounds for a long time to come. This war is real madness. Ukraine has become a land of fire. Where Russian soldiers come, no one manages to survive, cities become ghosts."
At the end of his speech, His Beatitude Sviatoslav appealed to the scientific and academic community to "investigate and condemn the Russian World ideology, which aims to solve the Ukrainian issue as the Nazis wanted to solve the Jewish issue. I am confident that together we can resist this dangerous ideology of our time."
Archbishop Mario Delpini of Milan also spoke to the audience, expressing solidarity with the Ukrainian people and assuring the support of the Archdiocese of Milan. "We are watching with horror everything that is happening in your country, and we are trying to help in everything we can: prayer, hosting refugees, medical cooperation, etc."