Yurash: Level of lies in statement of UOC KP press service is over-the-top

Head of the Department for Religious Affairs and Nationalities at the Ministry of Culture Andrei Yurash. Photo: "Glavcom"

The head of the Department for Religious Affairs at the Ministry of Culture of Ukraine Andrei Yurash, stated that in the Explanation of the press service of the Kiev Patriarchate dated June 5 of this year, there is “a lie that casts a shadow on the authority of the last head of the former UOC KP”. Yurash wrote about this on his Facebook page.

According to Yurash, in December 2018, the UOC KP was liquidated and is "a non-existent religious structure". In addition, he believes that "in this supposedly official document ... the level of lies and manipulation is just over-the-top".

According to the official, “if Patriarch Filaret knew and blessed this document, then he is personally responsible for it. If this statement appeared without the knowledge of the Patriarch, then it is urgent to change the personnel that is gathered around His Holiness.”

Yurash is sure that “the authors of the Explanation either do not fully possess the information or are deliberately lying” since, according to him, “a special meeting” was convened before the “Unification Council”, and the text of the document on the liquidation of the UOC KP and joining the structure of the UOC (PCA) to be created, which should be adopted by the Local Council of the UOC-KP, was agreed (by the way, the identical text was proposed for a parallel UAOC liquidation council), and one of the bishops of the then UOC-KP, authorized to negotiate (if this bishop sees fit, he can well confirm all these facts), went to Patriarch Filaret to harmonize the proposed text. After approximately an hour and a half, this bishop returned and announced that the Patriarch was agreeing on the text of the liquidation resolution of the Local Council of the UOC KP.”

According to the official, this means that “the statement about spontaneity and that no one planned to terminate the UOC KP, to put it mildly, does not correspond to the real state of affairs.”

He also urged the staff of the press center of the Kiev Patriarchate not to manipulate the truth, not to tamper with the facts, not to “let down” and “not to discredit an authoritative and respected 90-year-old church leader who worked so hard to promote the idea of the canonical Ukrainian autocephaly”.

Earlier, the UOJ wrote that the “Kiev Patriarchate” believes that the vote on the liquidation of the UOC-KP did not comply with the regulations, was held under pressure from the Phanar’s hierarchs and, therefore, was illegitimate.

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