Students from the theological institutions of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church and Orthodox Church of Ukraine made a joint appeal to seminarians from Russian institutions to tell them the truth about events in Ukraine and urge them to pray for “the end of this shameful and unjust war”. They recorded their appeal in two languages.
The Institute of Ecumenical Studies of Ukrainian Catholic University, described the idea as follows: “Observing the waves of disinformation from the Russian Federation regarding the war in Ukraine, particularly those that originate from the Church, the seminarians of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine and the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church had an idea to speak directly to seminarians in Russia”
According to the IES, this appeal was prompted by several initiatives, aiming to better acquaint seminarians from the UGCC and OCU, which were organized in 2021, when seminarians from the Lviv and Kyiv UGCC theological seminaries and Kyiv Orthodox Theology Academy of OCU met each other. One of these initiatives, Project by the Open Orthodox University and New Library of Sophia the Wisdom, was dedicated searching for a common heritage and the exchanging of unique traditions of the Greek-Catholic and Orthodox churches. The other – “School for Interfaith Dialogue – an informal meeting point for future Church servants”, was organized by the Institute of Ecumenical Studies at UCU in partnership with the UGCC Commission for Interfaith and Interreligious Affairs, the Kyiv Orthodox Theology Academy and the Eastern European Institute last June.
Seminarians from the Ternopil and Drohobych UGCC theological seminaries also joined the initiative of the video-appeal.
“Seminarians – are the future pastors of Christ, who are called to witness the truth here and now. Thus, the aim of this video is to bring the truth about events, happening now, to seminarians in Russia, and to urge them to pray for peace and an end to this shameful and unjust war. The main task and idea of the video is to reach out to the hearts and minds of seminarians in Russia, so that they would hear and understand us. We hope that the message we are sending to the seminarians in Russia will become an appeal for action in spreading the truth”, - Stepan Zelinskyi, a seminarian at Lviv Theological Seminary, said.
The authors of the appeal hope that students from other Ukrainian institutions of higher education will join this initiative to reach out to student youth in the Russian Federation.
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