In more than four years of war with Russia, the Ukrainian Armed Forces have still not been able to staff the Military Chaplaincy Service

Four years into the war with Russia, the staffing rate of chaplains in units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine stands at about 60 percent. Given this situation, the state still legally restricts the admission of clergy from the Ukrainian Orthodox Church to chaplaincy service, while actively mobilizing UOC clergy and enlisting them in the Armed Forces of Ukraine as enlisted personnel. These figures were announced during a briefing at “Ukrinform.”

The Military Chaplaincy Service, which officially began operations on September 6, 2022, was established to meet the spiritual and religious needs of service members and their families. Ukrainian Armed Forces Colonel Oleksandr Vovkotecha, who heads the service, emphasized that “the key principles of its activities are the equality of all faiths, respect for freedom of belief, and the rejection of the forced imposition of religious convictions.”

Despite this, tens of thousands of service members who identify as believers of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church are deprived of pastoral care due to discriminatory provisions in Ukrainian law that prohibit UOC priests from serving as chaplains in the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Moreover, clergy of the UOC, —unlike representatives of other religious denominations—are not only denied the right to defer military service but are also regularly subjected to harsh mobilization by representatives of the TCC on the streets of Ukraine.

Thus, clergy of the UOC, having been forcibly mobilized into the Armed Forces of Ukraine, are often subjected to “spiritual guidance” by representatives of other denominations, among whom clergy of the OCU and the UGCC are the most active. There have been known cases where representatives of these denominations have persuaded UOC priests to leave the Church and join the Ukrainian schism or union in order to avoid military service during wartime.

As a reminder, it was previously reported that Archimandrite Epiphany (Rudenko), rector of the UOC’s Church of the Intercession in the village of Khmelna, changed his jurisdiction and joined the OCU. The decision to switch was made by the priest immediately after his detention by officers of the Territorial Recruitment Center (TRC).