UOC spokesman: In case of pressure, the Church can react like in Montenegro
When the rights of the Church are infringed, one should be sensible to understand where to be renitent and where to be humble, the UOC spokesman assures.
The deputy head of the Department for External Church Relations of the UOC, Archpriest Nikolai Danilevich, in the program "Right to Faith" on First Cossack channel stated that if the authorities continue to discredit the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, a Montenegrin scenario is quite possible.
The priest told how he participated in one of the religious processions against the anti-church law in Montenegro. These cross processions, led by the deceased Montenegrin Metropolitan Amfilohije (Radovic), gathered a huge number of believers. During the pitstops, short prayers were held, after which Metropolitan Amfilohije delivered sermons, not being afraid to denounce the secular authorities and personally the Montenegrin President Djukanovic for infringing on the rights of the Church.
“I stood nearby and heard him speak openly about everything. We tend to hope that the situation will resolve itself, we try to remain calm, but the wisdom is to understand where to act like Vladyka Amfilohije, who proved the effectiveness of this path (after all, the anti-church law was changed), and where, as in our case, to be humble. However, when the need arises, we will follow the path of Vladyka Amfilohije,” said the UOC spokesman.
Father Nikolai believes that Orthodox Christians in Montenegro are more united than believers in Ukraine, because half of the population took to the streets of the cities of Montenegro in defense of the Orthodox Church. But he added that, if necessary, numerous believers will take to the streets of Ukrainian cities to protect the rights of the canonical Church.
“Every Sunday nearly 2 million people go to our churches, on big holidays there are even more, and the same number of believers will take to the streets of cities, if there is a need to uphold religious rights.
Archpriest Nicholas called on the Ukrainian authorities not to play off people on religious grounds and to allow people to go to the church they choose, without renaming or infringing on the rights of believers of the UOC, so that, God forbid, to prevent the religious wars the history of Ukraine knows of ...
As the UOJ previously reported, the UOC denied the information about the restriction of its rights by the ROC Synod.
