Chancellor of the UOC: No Сrime can be Сommitted in the Name of God

Religion cannot cause murder and war. This was said by the Chancellor of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, Metropolitan Anthony, commenting on the declaration on the results of the meeting of Pope Francis and Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia Kirill, reports RBC-Ukraine.

"It was underlined a very important position: no crime can be committed in the name of God. Religion cannot cause murder and war. They who use religious ideas as cover go against God ", – said Metropolitan Anthony.

The Bishop noted that every 5 minutes in the world one Christian is killed: "It points to the fact that Christianity is in danger, that there is a systematic war against Christianity."

According to the Bishop, the special attention in the document was given to the Middle East as "the situation in the region is dangerous because it can break into flame of World War III." Therefore, the church hierarchy made an appeal – to stop the bloodshed.

According to the Bishop, in addition to the persecution of Christians, a special concern in the document was caused by the secularization of modern Europe.

"When wearing crosses or other Christian attributes is prohibited, when it is banned to speak, for example, about the birth of Christ - it is a very serious challenge. The Declaration emphasizes that the soul of Europe is the Christian faith, and we must do everything possible to preserve the Christian foundations of society and European civilization itself as Christian", – continued the Chancellor of the UOC.

The Pope and the Patriarch dwelt on problems of social injustice, family values, euthanasia and biomedical reproductive technologies.

"Finally, for us it is a very important point of the Declaration which emphasizes that the modern Christian mission, evangelism does not allow any form of proselytism", – concluded the Bishop.

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