"Why are they still here?": religious scholar proposes to evict UOC clergy from Ukraine

Religious scholar Yuriy Chornomorets, a supporter and lobbyist of the OCU in the media, said that the state should react more harshly to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. Chornomorets is convinced that the UOC is not afraid of the state authorities, since the government is still “playing democracy,” while it is high time to expel the bishops and priests of the canonical Church from the country. He said this on the air of Radio NV.

“This is an issue (expulsion of the UOC from Ukraine – ed.) that depends on the state. We now see a lot of strange cases, for example, it has been established that a significant number of bishops of the Moscow Patriarchate in Ukraine have Russian citizenship. They were sanctioned by the National Security and Defense Council and deprived of Ukrainian citizenship. But for some reason, these people are not abroad, not evicted from Ukraine, but continue to lead believers, priests, etc. as Russian citizens. There are a significant number of people who, as priests and bishops, committed crimes, and only a few of them have been convicted. It is clear that all this delay on the part of the state with the adoption of the law on religious security has a very negative impact on the overall plan because religious problems require an emergency response, a quick reaction to anti-state activities,” – said the religious scholar.

Chornomorets believes that the UOC is not afraid of the Ukrainian authorities, as the government is trying to give the persecution of the UOC a legitimate overtone. He also argues that the UOC is much more afraid of Moscow, which is why they do everything as the Russian capital says.

“These people have been preaching against the state of Ukraine for decades, they are in favor of some kind of all-Russian caliphate. Why are they still here? We have such a reaction to them that we will be tinkering with them for a long time, adhering to some European norms, solving all this through the courts… Of course, all this has a negative impact. Then the state, of course, has no authority in the eyes of these bishops and priests of the Moscow Patriarchate because they do not see the state fairly punishing the crimes of the Moscow Patriarchate in Ukraine. At the same time, they see that Moscow is a force that will punish them if necessary. That is why they are afraid of Moscow, but not at all of Kyiv,” – Chornomorets added.

Earlier, Yuriy Chornomorets stated that despite the ongoing pressure on the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, the churches of this denomination are visited by many more people than the religious buildings belonging to the OCU. The religious scholar noted that the OCU has a large number of internal problems that the organization continues to ignore. In addition to the low attendance of the OCU churches, Chernomorets also noted the problem of the recognition of the Ukrainian schism by the Local Churches, which has actually stopped.