"Understanding" in Volyn: Priest reports good relations

The letter was written on the occasion of the upcoming tenth anniversary of Ukrainian Independence (August 24) and Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma's visit to Volyn (June 16 to 17). The regional religious leaders who signed the statement include: the metropolitans of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church-Moscow Patriarchate (UOC-MP) and the Ukrainian Orthodox Church-Kyivan Patriarchate (UOC-KP) for Lutsk (the regional center), the Roman Catholic bishop, an archpriest of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church (UGCC), representatives of the Baptists, Seventh-Day Adventists, the Church of the Full Gospel, the New Apostolic Church, Progressive Judaism and others. Fr. Behei commented that it's a fairly brief letter and smoothes out all the rough edges in interdenominational relations. "The initiator of the letter, like always," Fr. Roman notes, "was the Regional Administration and the Committee for Religious Matters, which drafted the text of the letter." Commenting on the interdenominational situation in the region, with the Pope's upcoming visit to Ukraine in mind, Fr. Roman announced that "in Volyn up to the present day no one has said anything against the visit, not even the metropolitan of the Moscow Patriarchate [UOC-MP] or his clergy. I have not heard one report that they said anything publicly against the Pope's visit." Fr. Roman thinks that relations with the Orthodox are fairly good, whatever jurisdiction they belong to. (The Orthodox Church in Ukraine is divided into 3 major jurisdictions.) They occasionally get together to consider problems common to all. "We work on documents [like this] together, you could say that's an act of mutual understanding. However, clearly in some of their sermons, as a matter of habit, from time to time they do touch on the problem of 'Uniatism.'"

"Uniatism" is a pejorative term to describe the phenomenon of the Eastern Catholic Churches, which follow Eastern Christian traditions but are in full ecclesial union with Rome. Nevertheless, in his seven years in Volyn, Fr. Roman cannot recall even one case of a serious conflict. "If some misunderstanding arises or rumors are spreading, I go immediately to the Orthodox metropolitan, we sit down and talk and come to a common understanding of the situation." More often disagreements arise between representatives of the UOC-MP and the UOC-KP, not involving the Greek Catholics. Fr. Roman recalls instances when he and the leadership of the UOC-MP protested some intolerant act of the UOC-KP representatives, who proclaim "Moscow is not our mother; Rome is not our father." Regardless of all of this, Orthodox faithful and clergy have come up to him asking if he can help them get invitations to various events which will be part of the papal visit to Ukraine.