Ukrainian schoolchildren forced to learn the history of OCU and Tomos

Illustration from a history textbook for grade 11. Photo: page screenshot

A photo of one of the pages of a history textbook for grade 11 was published on the Web, paragraph 28 of which tells about the "struggle for the Ukrainian Autocephalous Church" by the Ukrainian state.

The authors of the textbook, published in April 2019 and recommended by the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine, are Vitaly Vlasov and Stanislav Kulchitsky. The school curriculum of the history course in their edition says that the "struggle for autocephaly", which began in 1992, thanks to presidents Kravchuk, Kuchma, Yushchenko and Poroshenko "resulted in victory".

The new program notes that the creation of the OCU and granting of the Tomos to the new church structure from the head of the Patriarchate of Constantinople "consolidated and united the patriotic forces" of the country. At the same time, the authors consider the main victory to be "leveling the influence of the ROC on the internal life" of Ukrainians. The Ukrainian Orthodox Church in the textbook is called either the UOC-MP, or the ROC.

The text is replete with dates of the stages of the formation of the OCU and patriotic quotes from Poroshenko, head of Phanar Bartholomew, Filaret and head of the OCU Epiphany Dumenko. The paragraph ends with the statement of the ex-president that "the Tomos is actually another act of declaring Ukraine's independence for us."

When reviewing the stuff learnt, a teacher should ask senior pupils the following questions: “Why did the UOC-MP obstruct the receipt of the Tomos on autocephaly of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church? How was it manifested? What ideologemes did the opponents use to substantiate their position?"

Earlier, the UOJ wrote that Ukrainian children, who are baptized in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, are offered to recite pagan incantations to demons in the classroom.

Read also