Metropolitan Pavel, viceroy of the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra, turned to Zelensky and stated that the Lord would not forgive him and his family for the eviction of representatives of the UOC from the Lavra. “I tell you and your pack that our tears will not fall to the ground, they will fall on your head. Do you think that, having come into power on our backs, you can do this? … Woe to you! Be afraid!” Pavel said. https://twitter.com/vicktop55/status/1641301982722891781
This is what happened. . .
(Please do not miss the little girl at 1:45 in the video below. Not sure what she’s singing but she’s doing it with conviction.)
I do believe she’s singing the Slavonic version of the Paschal hymn, “Christ is Risen” a.k.a. «Χριστός Ανέστη».
That little girl is really something. May God bless her little heart.
That’s right. The English translation of the hymn is:
“Christ is risen from the dead,
Trampling down death by death,
And upon those in the tombs bestowing life!”
It’s sung once on the Sunday before Great Lent and then a million times during the Paschal season.
It is! It’s the Paschal Troparion!
While praying outside of the Lavra a young woman is circled by dancing Ukrainian fools ..
https://twitter.com/vicktop55/status/1642230826824761344?s=46&t=f3aMdmUs-8hDV-K09VH61A
The prophesies will not manifest merely because God revealed them, but rather because God knew in advance the stupid decisions that idiotic, egotistical humans would make in the future…and yet, despite what has been well-publicized, the words of Psalm 134 are unfolding before our eyes as well…”they shall have eyes but they will not see….they shall have ears, but they will not listen…”
In a few days, we will hear a troparion on Great Thursday evening (matins for Great Friday), that is also very important for the “Archons” to listen to… Ἄρχοντες λαῶν συνήχθησαν, κατὰ τοῦ Κυρίου, καὶ κατὰ τοῦ Χριστοῦ αὐτοῦ…
Rulers [Archons] of nations gathered together against the Lord and against His Christ [Anointed One]
Thank you Marko for printing this. Profound.
I can’t help but feel the difference in Metropolitan Pavel as opposed to the titular bishops of Cpole. One was a man, the others are dilettantes.
Let’s see…how many children killed in the name of war?
Turley had this on the situation:
https://turleytalks.com/monks-resisting-persecution-in-ukraine/
If Zelensky were smart (and not a satanic lackey) he would call off the dogs and recognize Onuphry (while de-recognizing Epiphony).
This would be a political masterstroke.
But he won’t because his globalist masters won’t allow him to do so. They feel it is their duty to destroy the Orthodox Church by rending it asunder. The program in the Ukraine is their first major step in doing so. (The funding of the Fordhamites and the continued liberalization of the GOA are other pincers in this strategy.)
Speaking of the funding of the Fordhamites and the “continued liberation of the GOA,” the following article is revealing. Apparently, Scripture and the teachings of the Church embraced by the Russian Orthodox Church in “recent years” [this is so funny; like the Russians changed course] has “disputed the modern definitions of universal human rights.”
Have they never read Galatians 3:28? “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.”
Of course they have. They’re theologians and scholars! But this is their problem: They don’t want equal rights! If they were equal, they’d have to struggle like the rest of us to live up to the same expectations. That’s not “modern!” Modern means to have no standards. Modern means to change the teachings. Modern means to hijack the Church.
It’s our rights that are being trampled. We want to worship in a way that’s consistent with the teachings of Christ and the Holy Apostles and they won’t let us! How dare we worship in a way that’s not “modern”!!! Who are we to decide? They decide. Forget 2000 years of tradition. They dictate how we worship. Can’t go to another church that does exactly what they prescribe? No. They have to take our Church and they’ll lie, cheat and steal to do it. Intellectual honesty doesn’t exist in their world. And the kicker is: they get paid for it.
Orthodox Christian Center Secures Luce Funds to Promote Human Rights
Fordham’s Orthodox Christian Studies Center has secured two grants totaling $610,000 that will be used to fund a multiyear research project devoted toward the issue of human rights.
One grant, for $360,000, comes from the Henry Luce Foundation, while the other, for $250,000, comes from Leadership 100. The center received the Leadership 100 grant in February, and the Luce grant in March.
The Center will use the grants to fund an interdisciplinary, international research initiative on Orthodox Christianity’s complex, even turbulent, engagement with human rights discourse.
Center co-director George Demacopoulos, Ph.D., professor of theology and the Father John Meyendorff & Patterson Family Chair of Orthodox Christian Studies, said he and his colleagues will bring together the world’s foremost scholars to collaborate with journalists, public intellectuals, and policy makers for the study.
The goal of the project is to create and disseminate comprehensive analyses of the contemporary relationship between Orthodox Christianity and human rights that can be shared with Orthodox leaders and heads of state around the world .
A Resistance to the West
The issue is especially pressing today, because the Russian Orthodox Church, which counts 70 million of the world’s 260 million Orthodox Christians, has in recent years disputed the modern definitions of universal human rights. In former Soviet Union countries where a majority of the population is Orthodox Christian, leaders are ambivalent about a universal conception of human rights that they perceive to be dictated by the West.
Demacopoulos said that the feeling is not universal though. In countries such as Syria or Turkey, where Orthodox Christians form the majority of the Christian component of society but are still very much in the minority overall, those Orthodox Christian communities absolutely embrace human rights and the notion of religious freedom.
In addition to addressing leaders within the Orthodox Christian faith, Demacopoulos said the project, which will rely on the research of 15 scholars, will offer guidance to authorities such as the U.S. State Department and the European Union. The scholars will meet at an annual three-day meeting over the five-year period and will publish academic books and articles as well as op-eds, blogs, and new media.
“We want to provide leaders with more comprehensive, nuanced, and sophisticated understanding about what is actually going on here, so they don’t just take propaganda pieces and assume that the entire Orthodox world or even the entire Russian world believes this,” he said.
Offering a Nuanced Perspective
Fellow co-director Aristotle Papanikolaou, Ph.D., professor of theology and the Archbishop Demetrios Chair in Orthodox Theology and Culture, said the Russian Orthodox Church has been trying to redefine human rights language in such a way that allows them to uphold “traditional values” for the last decade. This understanding of human rights doesn’t protect a band like Pussy Riot from protesting in a Church, or art that’s deemed blasphemous, and it’s consistent with laws that ban gay marriage and homosexual “propaganda.”
“Normally people would say, that’s a violation of human rights, and some Orthodox Christians want to say ‘No it’s not. We have our own particular interpretation of human rights, and we are justified in doing that because the West’s concept of human rights is biased and anti-Christian,” he said. “Our project hopes to offer a more nuanced understanding of Orthodox Christianity’s relation to human rights language than the diametrical opposition proposed by certain Orthodox Christians, especially in the post-communist context.”
Papanikolaou further noted that the Russian government also uses the language of human rights and the defense of religious freedom to justify its ongoing military intervention in Syria.
“It’s a big post-Communist issue, and it’s of a piece a wider, global critique of western liberalism,” he said.
“Western theorizers of human rights have got to pay attention to Russia, and more broadly to the Orthodox Christian world.”
https://news.fordham.edu/living-the-mission/orthodox-christian-center-secures-luce-funds-promote-human-rights/
If I am following this blog correctly, the origins of this atrocity lies at the feet of Pat. Bart who intentionally set these wheels in motion. Pat. Bart’s apostasy has put Met. Pavel in chains. What are Pat. Bart’s peers going to do about this hot mess? What is their duty before God? What is ours? I’m truly seeking leadership.
Exactly! While I do not think Barfolomew caused the war in Ukraine, his interference in Ukrainian ecclesiastical affairs created divisions that made much more possible the persecution of the canonical Orthodox Church, i.e., the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. He created a wound, or exacerbated a pre-existing wound, made it much worse, and thus much more easily infected. Barf is the anti-physician, the anti-healer, notwithstanding his claims to the contrary.
I agree with you. But if Bartholomew hadn’t created the OCU, the Nazi and nationalists would have had nothing to rally around. They would not have a reason to target the canonical Church in such overt, aggressive manner. For them, this is not a war between nations. It is a war for their national identity which is directly tied to the OCU. They have no interest in the canonical Church because it includes the Russian Church.
Bartholomew has no interest in the canonical Church because it includes the Russian Church!
It is a match made in heaven. They are both content to operate outside the Church. The important question is what are the bishops going to do about it? Because if they do nothing, schismatic churches all over the world are going to be popping up diluting what it means to be Orthodox.
In a canonical church there should be:
neither [Ukrainian] nor [Russian], bond not free;
for they should be all one in Christ Jesus.
I agree with you, too, although I had to read over your second sentence several times. “But if Bartholomew hadn’t created the OCU, the Nazi and nationalists would have had nothing to rally around.” I assume you meant that by creating the “OCU” Barf gave the nationalists, etc., something to rally around at the ecclesiastical level. Because at the political, cultural, and social levels they had already been rallying around their hatred for Russian-speaking Ukrainians, and had been doing so since at least as early as 2014.
The “OCU” wasn’t “created” by Barf until several years later. By creating the “OCU,” Barf created a new fissure, a new wound as I previously suggested, a new entry point for the infection that is now manifesting itself.
Yes, that’s what I meant. Plus, they are now the NATIONAL church (which is what they said it would be when they made the request to Bartholomew) and the UOC’s not in it. The UOC is now “officially” an interloper.
‘…the “The UOC is now “officially” an interloper.’
This is the latest manifestation of an ancient Germannic tradition.
When the Angles and Saxons invaded the province of Britannia
they dubbed the native Cymry Welsh, which means foreigners.
When the Continental Saxons infiltrated what was Dacia,
they named the natives Wallachs (Vlachs), which means foreigners.
Now, as the New Nazi Banderite Inquisition subverts the Ukraine,
it calls the traditional Ukrainian Orthodox Church foreign.
Ecclesiastes 1:9-10 [KJV]
9 The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be;
and that which is done is that which shall be done:
and there is no new thing under the sun.
10 Is there any thing whereof it may be said, See, this is new?
it hath been already of old time, which was before us.
“Barf…”
A very acute observation!
I should clarify, I do not refer to the Pope of Istanbul as “Barf” out of disrespect or to draw comparisons to unpleasant things. The fourth letter of his name in Greek, Βαρθολομαίος, is Θ, pronounced as a hard “th”. However, in Russian, there is no hard “th” sound, so the name is transliterated as “Варфоломе́й,” the “f” sound being substituted for the “th” sound. The same thing happens with other Greek words or names borrowed into Russian. For example, the capital city of Greece, Athina (Αθήνα), is rendered into Russian as Афина. The hard “th” (Θ) is changed to Ф, pronounced like “f” or “ph”. Hence, Barfolomei, or Barf for short.
And if anyone doesn’t like that, well then, to borrow a phrase from Barf himself, “σκασίλα μου.”
Actually, though, the Russian Варфоломе́й would be Varfolomey… The Greek letter beta had changed to be pronounced vita long before Sts. Cyril and Methodius carried the Gospel—and the alphabet—to the Slavs.
In sound value, “v” is simply a voiced “f”.
“Barfolomew” is easier to say than “Barvolomew”.
Most Europeans at least have enough class to pronounce beta as “BEETA”
Yes, in Russian his name begins with a “v”, as it does in Greek.
Yes, all of that is true. But “Barf” seems to capture the essence much more so than “Varf.” So, yes, I was picking and choosing linguistic rules inconsistently based on what suited me. Which, come to think of it, serves as sort of a metaphor for what certain “hierarchs” have been doing.
“Ο σκοπός αγιάζει τα μέσα.”
🙂
My apologies. I took the English as is
and misunderstood your intention.
It’s actually quite common in Southern English dialects (eg Cockney)
to substitute ‘f’ for ‘th’ – as in the song: “Fings ain’t wot they used to be”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-eu4roYEJw
…but, as a Scot, my ear is attuned more to the Northern usage;
hence my misapprehension. Once again, my apologies.
In good conscience I cannot accept any apologies.
Met. Pavel’s closing comments (starting about 0:57) in his Ukrainian-accented Russian:
“I am very, very grateful to you all. I’m not going to weep, I’ve already cried out my tears. Pray that God will give them reasonableness. But if I die, then spread the word that the way of the cross has been completed….”.
“‘Woe to you! Be afraid!’ [Metropolitan] Pavel said”.
That sounds like a threat. If the Metropolitan is suggesting that the Russian Federation may use this expulsion of monks from the Kiev Caves Lavra to justify a military takeover of Kiev, then I would expect nations all over the world to voice grave concerns about the presence of any Russian Orthodox Church on their territory. Unfortunately, that may very well happen, and I think it would be the end of ROCOR.
Well, it must be said that these same types of “threats” were issued by the OT Prophets as well.
George,
Joseph is delusional. Not sure why you indulge him. The military takeover of Kiev is probably baked in the cake regardless of this travesty at the caves. It will be totally justified by the fact that the coup government is a willing accomplice in making war on Russians in the Ukraine and on Russia itself.
The question is how long we will have to wait for God’s justice.
Mr Lipper,
This one may take the cake, although your other comments often come close. Any reasonable person, any person truly concerned with what is happening in Ukraine, anyone with a true understanding of Orthodoxy, would have recognized that what Pavel said was in the context of divine justice.
To suggest, as you do, that Pavel was threatening a Russian military takeover of Kiev is both laughable and deluded.
Well said, blimbax!
If it was the end of ROCOR it would be because of abject hysteria. Both ROCOR and the MP Patriarchal Parishes endured the Cold War.
ROCOR was never suspect during the Cold War, because they were loud anti-Communists and in schism with the “Sergianist” Moscow Patriarchate.
As for the Patriarchal parishes, they probably were highly suspect by the U.S. government. Undoubtedly, they were infiltrated by the KGB.
Now they will be infiltrated by the FBI…
…and perhaps the MI5.
MI6 – that’s the external one. MI5 is internal;
or, at least, it’s supposed to be.
Are you serious? The Metropolitan was expressing concern about their souls, not calling for war. This twisting of an act of love by the Metropolitan into a war cry is evil. The monks are being thrown out of their homes during the Great Fast! The ancient Lavra is being defiled, and this is your interest in the matter? Are you Orthodox, Joseph? If so, I call on you in this holy season to repent.
Katherine, thank you, I want to believe you are right about the Metropolitan’s intentions. Yes, quotes can be misinterpreted. My point here is that the words, “Woe to you! Be afraid!”, can easily be interpreted as a threat.
I would also like to know where the title of this blog post came from, “God Will Not Forgive”.
That sounds like a threat too.
A Pauline one.
” Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! because ye build the tombs of the prophets, and garnish the sepulchres of the righteous,
[30] And say, If we had been in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.
[31] Wherefore ye be witnesses unto yourselves, that ye are the children of them which killed the prophets.
[32] Fill ye up then the measure of your fathers.
[33] Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?
[34] Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes: and some of them ye shall kill and crucify; and some of them shall ye scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city:
[35] That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar.”
Is this also a threat?
Or is it a prophecy?
Or, if unheeded, is it both?
Joseph, you realize that you did it again, don’t you? Why are you placing an interpretation on these words that they are threats? They’re not. They are admonitions to evil-doers to consider their actions in the light of their salvation.
This is love.
Actually, Joseph, the title was based on the words that were uttered by Metropolitan Pavel, about whom I was writing, and what he said that got him in trouble. It is sort of the central part of the story.
Your question, “I would also like to know where the title of this blog post came from. . . ,” is interesting because it suggests there was more to the title than intended.
What did YOU think I meant?
Gail,
I understand the title “God will not forgive” is from the Metropolitan’s words, but where are his words coming from? Is this from the Gospel? Christ’s Gospel says if we don’t forgive the sins of others, then God won’t forgive us our sins. We have to forgive.
So is the Metropolitan admonishing the monks and the UOC to forgive Zelensky’s government, because otherwise God won’t forgive the monastery and the UOC their sins?
No, I don’t think that’s what he is saying. Rather, the words of “God will not forgive” here seem aimed at Zelensky’s government. They could even be interpreted as words barring them from God’s forgiveness, if that were possible. The Gospel message, though, is to repent, and God will forgive us our sins. If we don’t forgive others, then God will not forgive us.
Zelensky is the government.
Perhaps Met. Pavel considers the government’s actions to be sin against the Holy Ghost.
That makes sense.
Joseph Lipper: “The Gospel message, though,
is to repent, and God will forgive us our sins.”
I see no sign of either Zelensky[y] or his government
repenting of the sins which they continue to commit.
The most difficult piece in my perspective is the in-our-faces realization that America and the West (including Patriarch Bartholomew and his lackeys, who are either willingly or unwillingly being used as power tools of the Western nihilists) are now religious persecutors. We are no longer the brave defenders of freedom that we claim to be.
I was a teenager in the 1980s-90s and was in the Army for 30 years. The leadership of the country that I knew and grew up with – the “standard of freedom worldwide” – I’m seeing that it’s more or less a sham. Our leaders are simply ruthless power brokers on the world stage, trying to dominate lest they be dominated. Remaining a bulwark of freedom and coexisting peacefully as one country among many is not in their lexicon.
The American leadership supported Orthodox Christianity (nominally) during the 20th century because it was a convenient tool to use in countering Soviet aggression. I mistook this for American leadership having some respect for the Orthodox faith. I remember reading in the St Nicholas Cathedral (OCA, Washington DC) commemorative book from 1988 – when they honored the millennium of the baptism of Russia with the erection of a bell tower right on Massachusetts Avenue (still there today) – how proud I was that President Reagan offered a letter to the booklet in honor and support of our Orthodox faith and traditions. Maybe he and those of his generation really did respect it, I don’t know.
But now, everything seems to be out on the table, and the complete disdain of our American leadership for our Holy Orthodox faith is clearly visible. From the complete trashing of the thousand-year-existing Ukrainian Orthodox Church under Metropolitan Onuphriy, to the fake, ersatz “church” created with the episcopal pretender “Epi-phony,” to the complete marginalization of everything Orthodox Christians hold holy and dear. It’s all out in the open, clear as day.
Metropolitan Pavel’s persecution and arrest is the latest manifestation of the nihilistic Western leadership’s hatred of everything Orthodox Christian. If anyone is prepared to withstand a 21st century Orthodox Christian persecution, it is probably Metropolitan Pavel. God does not have us go through life dramas that we cannot withstand, always calling on His help of course.
Met. Pavel reminds me of those stalwart Abbotts from the Pskov Caves Monastery that we read about in “Everyday Saints” – the ones who have no fear standing up to the Soviet authorities and whose bold, fearless faith prevented that monastery from ever closing during Soviet times.
What’s happening now is an in-your-face reminder to me that the 80-year-old faithful Orthodox Christians in my Pennsylvania parish as a youth had more wisdom in their little finger than the entirety of the modern American government.
I pray that someday we can cobble together a remnant American nation from what’s left over after this mess plays out. I simply don’t see public America in its current form – without faith in anything more than money and raw power – and captive to those fools who currently hold the reins of American power – lasting much longer.
Prayers for Metropolitan Pavel and for all suffering and persecuted faithful Orthodox Christians in Ukraine.
FTS, I could not say this any better.
Again, if I may reference my earlier response to Sarah, I encourage everyone to read Everyday Saints. In one story, the monks of one such monastery were able to hold off the Soviet commissars by threatening to go to Voice of America and spilling the beans to them. America was a force for good back then. It may have been expedient but God uses whom He will.
Your sacrifice was not in vain.
Zelensky will have the fate of Ceausesku.
Of course God forgives. Perhaps Metropolitan Pavel’s hyperbole was a result of his emotional state over his eviction, that would be understandable, surely he did not intend to be blasphemous.
I was always taught that blasphemy is against the Holy Spirit and it must be a conscious, hardened opposition to the truth.
What did Pavel say that was not true?
By all accounts, Zelensky has lived a questionable lifestyle and though he is acquainted with the Orthodox Church, has made a conscious decision to remain outside of it. In addition he is literally persecuting the Church. People have died at the hands of these Nazi nationalists who are a part of his government.
If God did not forgive Judas who persecuted Christ, on what basis would God forgive Zelensky who persecutes Christ through His Church? Christ died for His Church.
This is not a declaration. It’s a question.
From the Orthodox Study Bible, notes/explication for Matthew 12: 31-32….
“Blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is blasphemy against the divine activity of the Spirit, blasphemy against pure goodness. A sin against the Son of Man is more easily forgiven because the Jews did not know much about Christ. But blasphemy against the Spirit, whose divine activity they knew from the OT, will not be forgiven because it comes from a willful hardness of heart and a refusal to accept God’s mercy.
The Fathers are clear that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is not an “unforgivable sin”; nor does Jesus ever call this sin “unforgivable.” St. John Chrysostom teaches that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit would be forgivable if a person were to repent of it. Jesus makes this declaration knowing that those who blaspheme the Spirit are calling pure, divine goodness “evil,” and are beyond repentance by their own choice.“
God would have forgiven Judas had he repented, however Judas committed suicide and therefore was unable to repent.
Similarly, God would/will forgive Zelensky and all persecutors of His Church if they repent. The choice is theirs. Recall in the video of Met. Pavel’s arrest how he instructed us to pray for his captors.
Met. Pavel is simply stating a fact, observing their self-stated hardness of heart and their self-stated unwillingness to repent. They can repent or seek help to repent; the choice is theirs.
As near as I can tell, His Eminence did not commit blasphemy either against God the Father or God the Holy Spirit. His words were shocking and absolute only in the sense that he said nothing about the future. Of course Zelensky could repent.
In the meantime, as a bishop, he has the power to “bind and loose.”
If I am wrong, I ask for correction.
I suspect you’re right. “Woe be to . . . ” is found many times in Scripture. Presumably, there have been others who have done that which cannot be tolerated by God here and or in the life to come.
Revelation 21:8 But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.”
Nahum 3 [KJV]:
3 Woe to the bloody city! it is all full of lies and robbery;
the prey departeth not;
2 The noise of a whip, and the noise of the rattling of the wheels,
and of the pransing horses, and of the jumping chariots.
3 The horseman lifteth up both the bright sword and the glittering spear:
and there is a multitude of slain, and a great number of carcases;
and there is none end of their corpses; they stumble upon their corpses:
4 Because of the multitude of the whoredoms
of the wellfavoured harlot, the mistress of witchcrafts,
that selleth nations through her whoredoms,
and families through her witchcrafts.
5 Behold, I am against thee, saith the Lord of hosts;
and I will discover thy skirts upon thy face,
and I will shew the nations thy nakedness,
and the kingdoms thy shame.
6 And I will cast abominable filth upon thee,
and make thee vile,
and will set thee as a gazingstock.
7 And it shall come to pass, that all they
that look upon thee shall flee from thee, and say,
Nineveh is laid waste: who will bemoan her?
whence shall I seek comforters for thee?
Would the reading ring as true if Nineveh
were replaced by Washington or London?
Oh, I think so!
Metropolitan Kliment: Patriarch Bartholomew bears a huge sin for the suffering of the Orthodox in Ukraine
Monday, April 10, 2023
The conflict in the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra goes beyond legal problems, because it is obvious that the battle between the devil and God is taking place in the gate of the Lavra, said Metropolitan Kliment of Nežin and Priluška, president of the synodal information and educational department of the UPC.
In an interview for “Večernje Novosti”, he pointed out that all arguments against the presence of monks in the monastery are exclusively atheistic and God-fearing in nature.
“The state creates laws that are directly aimed at the liquidation of our church. And believers face insults and violations of rights everywhere, in public places, at work, at school,” says Bishop Kliment.
He adds that all the accusations made against Metropolitan Pavle are forgeries.
“It is obvious that right now the authorities had to forcefully expel the Metropolitan from the Lavra in order to facilitate the end of the process of expelling the monks. The Bishop was repeatedly told to leave the Lavra voluntarily. He categorically refused. As a result, criminal acts were faked, after for which the metropolitan was forcibly removed”, he states.
He reminds that the huge sin for the situation in Ukraine lies with Patriarch Bartholomew.
“On Patriarch Bartholomew, on him personally, lies a huge sin for all the blasphemy committed against Ukrainian holy places and for all the tears and sufferings of the Ukrainian Orthodox. Looking at his cynicism, one gets the impression that the revelation of the Holy Apostle Paul was fulfilled on him – hypocrisy and heresy are the seal sin that burns man’s conscience,” he concludes.
The Metropolitan reminds that in the history of Ukraine there have been many cases when the state created quasi-churches and pseudo-spiritual organizations as a substitute for the true apostolic church.
“Their task has remained unchanged – to poison society with amoral and depraved atheism. Modern schismatics have long testified that they will justify any vices for the benefit of the political conjuncture. A nation that does not have solid moral foundations is doomed to fail,” he warns.
Only God knows what awaits the Orthodox Church in different countries, Bishop Kliment believes, and adds that it is a thorn in the side of the world, which, according to the Gospel, lies in evil.