Expert: Opinion polls on support for OCU do not reflect real church life, while active believers choose UOC

Religious scholar Andriy Kovalev said that widespread sociological surveys showing an increase in support for the OCU and an alleged decrease in confidence in the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) cannot be considered an objective indicator of the real state of affairs in the church environment. According to him, the true strength of the Church is manifested not in statistics, but in the regular participation of believers in worship, and it is active parishioners who «vote with their feet» by choosing a particular denomination.

According to Channel 5, the expert emphasized that sociology applied to political parties is not suitable for assessing religious organizations. «This sociology can be trusted only if the UOC and the OCU were not religious organizations but political parties and participated in the elections,» the religious scholar explained.

Andriy Kovalev emphasized that when assessing the influence of the Church, it is necessary to take into account, first of all, Christian practitioners — those who regularly attend services on Sundays and holidays. These are the people who, in his words, «vote with their feet» by choosing a particular denomination. «We must understand that the strength of the church is not in real estate or churches, but in believers, in the people who enter these churches,» the expert said.

Kovalyov also noted that a significant proportion of respondents who declare a positive attitude toward the OCU in surveys are not actually active participants in church life. «These are mostly people who do not go to church, are not members of an active church, and may never come there,» he said. At the same time, according to Kovalev, «there are organized, convinced parishioners of the UOC who vote with their feet every Sunday and every holiday and go to this church.»

Earlier, the vice rector of the Ukrainian Catholic University (UCU) Myroslav Marynovych shared his vision of the development of the Ukrainian church crisis. Marynovych believes that legislative initiatives aimed at banning the Ukrainian Orthodox Church will not significantly affect the situation and will not change the attitude of the clergy and believers of the UOC to the issue of unification with the OCU and loyalty to the state authorities. In this regard, Marynovych suggested that the church and legal aspects of the issue should be distinguished.