Met. Hilarion: Renaming the UOC is like Jewish badges in Holocaust

Head of the Department for External Church Relations of the Russian Orthodox Church, Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk

The Ukrainian Orthodox Church is not the Russian Church, it is the Ukrainian Church, stressed the head of the Department for External Church Relations of the ROC Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk, reports "Interfax".

In his opinion, renaming the UOC into the Russian Church means “marking the Church as an enemy organization”, and it is for this purpose that the relevant bills are being created.

According to him, the Ukrainian authorities want to completely seize the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, "they want to outlaw it".

Met. Hilarion explained that the UOC believers "consider themselves Ukrainians, they are patriots of their country".

As the UOC reported, earlier political expert Viacheslav Pikhovshek stated that renaming the UOC into the Russian Orthodox Church is an attempt to create an “internal enemy” in Ukraine, and will give rise to harassment.

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