“The biggest problem for Ukraine today is the split of the Orthodox Church into two parts – into the Kyiv and the Moscow Patriarchates,” he said.
Patriarch Filaret of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church Kyiv Patriarchate was reported as saying this in an interview with Espreso.tv, as cited by Gazeta.ua.
“The biggest problem for Ukraine today is the split of the Orthodox Church into two parts – into the Kyiv and the Moscow Patriarchates,” he said.
According to Patriarch Filaret, Russia has taken advantage of this.
“If it was not for the split, a war that is ongoing in Donbas, Moscow’s intervention in Ukrainian matters and annexing of the Crimea would not have taken place. The Church would have united and consolidated Ukrainian society so that the aggressor would have no opportunity to intervene in these cases,” said the hierarch.
“Why the Crimea rebelled? Temporarily, but rebelled? There was the Moscow Church, while the Kyiv Patriarchate was weak in Crimea. Why the war is ongoing in Donbas and not in Halychyna? In Halychyna, the Orthodox and Greek Catholic Churches stand on the patriotic positions. The aggressor has nothing to do there,” said the Patriarch.
Moscow holds the position of “accession” to it, Patriarch Filaret noted.
“We want to unite into the one Orthodox Church, separated from the Moscow Patriarchate, i.e. the local Ukrainian orthodox Church. If we achieve that, then Ukraine will not be accessible for Russia because Ukrainian society will be consolidated. There will be no Russian agents. Today they are numerous in all areas, and therefore Russia has dared to attack,” he said.