Head of UGCC admits that UOC will go underground in case of final ban

The head of the UGCC, Sviatoslav Shevchuk, admitted that the Ukrainian Orthodox Church will go underground in the event of further pressure from the state and a final ban. He added that the legislative ban on the UOC is not enough, so the OCU and the UGCC will have to work hard to convince the UOC believers to abandon their Church. He said this in an interview with Radio Liberty.

“The Church is people. The Church of the Moscow Patriarchate has indeed cultivated over the years everything that united or, let’s say, maintained unity with the spiritual and religious culture of the Russian so-called world. Therefore, there are obviously risks. We are talking about very personal things here. Each person makes their own personal choice. And when we talk about the church, we are really talking about the very deepest strings of the human soul. And I think that Ukrainian society, including religious leaders, still has a lot of work to do to ensure that those people who still consider the Moscow Church to be their spiritual and moral authority can consciously and voluntarily reassess their attitude toward those institutions. That is why I am convinced that it is not enough to prohibit something by law. We also need to really think about how we can continue to live and exist as a united society, how to educate our believers. Therefore, this law, these processes that we are witnessing, in my opinion, are only at their beginning,” — Shevchuk said.

Earlier, religious scholar Yuriy Chornomorets, a supporter and lobbyist of the OCU in the media, said that the state should respond more harshly to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. Chornomorets is convinced that the UOC is not afraid of the state authorities, as the government is still “playing democracy,” while it is high time to expel the bishops and priests of the canonical Church from the country.