DESS official on the trial of the UOC: We cannot give an assessment of canonical and religious aspects

The first deputy head of the State Service of Ukraine for Ethnopolitics and Freedom of Conscience (DESS), Viktor Voynalovych, has said that state bodies have no right to interfere in canonical and religious aspects of the church structure. At the same time, the official sees the need for a judicial ban of the UOC, as the church has «institutional ties» with the Russian Orthodox Church. About this he told in an interview with the publication «Apostrophe».

«The fact is that we, state officials, representatives of the State service, so and judges, are faced with one such problem. That is, we are dealing with a special specific sphere, which belongs to the religious. And we must clearly adhere to one specific single rule, principle: we cannot interfere, we cannot analyze state bodies, we cannot evaluate their canonical and other religious aspects, which are the subject of their internal religious-church structure. But as for all other external things with which they come out — institutional, organizational ties with a well-known religious organization, which is banned in Ukraine — the Russian Orthodox Church — this is also the subject of research of the State Service on ethno-politics and freedom of conscience, and, probably, the consideration of judges, » — said Voynalovych.

Earlier, associate professor, candidate of law, head of the Center for the Study of the Rule of Law and Religion Dmytro Vovk published an article describing the transformation of state-church relations in Ukraine. Vovk said that nowadays the state is interested not only in legal aspects of relations with the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, but also in purely canonical aspects, which was not the case before.