Novinsky: Presidents come and go, but the Church is forever

Head of the OCU Epiphany, 5th president of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko and Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople. Photo: pbs.twimg.com

Presidents come and go, but the canonical Church was, is and will be. The MP of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine and the Deacon of the UOC Vadim Novinsky said this on air of Parsuna program on Spas TV channel.

He recalled that in the past few years in Ukraine, religious issues have become issues of "ultimately one-sided" state policy.

“The previous president Petro Poroshenko made the creation of the so-called local Church, firstly, part of his political work and secondly, a very important part of his election campaign,” said the people's deputy. “And, of course, all the resources of the government were aimed at creating this church. The state intervened into church matters in a very rude, shameless way. We saw the Verkhovna Rada make decisions against the canonical Church, which has existed since 988, from the baptismal font of Kiev to this day, and tried to intervene in the Church and dictate how it should live, what it should do, under what conditions it should continue its existence. Those decisions were made by the people who had most likely never read Our Father before, members of the Greek Catholic Church, the Protestant Church, and other religions got suddenly concerned about the fate of Ukrainian Orthodoxy.”

After the change of power, he added, the OCU, into which Poroshenko pooled all his efforts at the prompting of his political technologists, began to fall into oblivion, while “true believers from the Church haven’t left anywhere, and the temples that were captured by the OCU proponents are empty <...> both in quarantine and without quarantine."

“With the advent of the new president, the atmosphere regarding the Church as a whole has changed,” stated Vadim Novinsky. “Common negative atmosphere, repressions against bishops, clergy, active believers – it is a thing of the past. Maybe it will come back again, because even now, as soon as the situation with the coronavirus arose, the media immediately started the propaganda policy they did 2-3 years ago. But now the religious ambience in Ukraine is much better than it was under Petro Poroshenko.”

Moreover, the people's deputy is convinced that sooner or later the Church in Ukraine will be united.

“Of course, since Patriarch Bartholomew did not condemn but recognized and legitimized the schism, the healing of the schism is postponed for some long period of time. But I am sure that as soon as the support of both the state and the state department, as well as some external forces ceases, then the Church of Ukraine will be united sooner or later, as it was in the 20th century with the Renovation Church, which was supported by the Soviet power and Constantinople. Our Church is forever, while presidents come and go” he upheld.

As reported by the UOJ, Vadim Novinsky told how he became a deacon of the Church.

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