UOC hierarch: Without Christianity, civilization is doomed to extinction

Bishop Victor (Kotsaba). Photo: Facebook

On October 29, 2020, Bishop Victor (Kotsaba) of Baryshevka, the vicar of the Kyiv Metropolis of the UOC, wrote in his blog on the “I-Korrespondent” website that having renounced Christian values, modern civilization is doomed to extinction.

Bishop Victor, commenting on the wave of terrorist attacks that swept France, noted that “for several years Europe has been consistently abandoning its Christian heritage and traditional values in favour of multiculturalism and liberalism” and “it is no coincidence that literally three days before the wave of terrorist attacks that we are witnessing today, one of the French officials said that France is a Muslim country."

However, the hierarch recalled that “it was France that gave the Christian world such people as St. Irenaeus of Lyons, Holy Martyr Genovefa (Genevieve), Hieromartyr Dionysius of Paris and many others. It is on the territory of France that there are the beautiful temples of Notre Dame de Paris, the Rouen Cathedral, the Sacre Coeur Basilica. France gave the world Victor Hugo, Stendhal and Antoine de Saint-Exupéry."

In his opinion, the fact that now France is called Muslim, like everything that happens there, "vividly testifies: having abandoned Christian roots, modern society will become no more civilized, democratic or liberal but will slide into the abyss of evil, murder and death".

“Without Christianity, our civilization is simply doomed to extinction,” Vladyka emphasized.

At the same time, he is sure that “projecting what is happening in France onto Ukraine, we must seriously think about it” because “the example of this European state clearly says that the most terrible confrontation is religious”.

“This means that those politicians who are trying to play the “card of religious confrontation” in Ukraine do not know what they are doing. By confronting supporters of different religions, different confessions, different religious views, politicians, in fact, put their country and their people on the verge of survival,” the bishop believes.

According to him, “we can already talk about conflicts within Ukrainian families, when the father does not speak to his son, the wife – to her husband, and the parents – to their children, and all this because one of them ‘goes to the wrong church’".

“You cannot play people off against one another, and even more so, you cannot do this on religious grounds. Because religion touches the very depths of human nature, touches our heart and soul. It is for religion, more often than not, that people are ready to give their lives," emphasized Bishop Victor and urged " to seek peace instead of inciting enmity", recalling that "the God of Christians is the God of love and peace, not the God of war and hatred."

As reported earlier, a man shouting " Allahu Akbar" with a gun in his hands was shot dead in Avignon and at the Notre Dame Basilica in Nice, a terrorist beheaded a woman.

The situation in France has escalated after the brutal murder by a Muslim of a 47-year-old college teacher who showed cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad in class. On Sunday, October 18, tens of thousands of people in different cities of the country rallied in memory of the murdered teacher and in defence of freedom of speech. Later, in Paris, two women, screaming "dirty Arabs", attacked a Muslim family with a knife.

To follow the events, protesters chanted "Allahu Akbar" at the French Embassy in Moscow, and French politician Marine Le Pen called on the French authorities to close all radical Islamist organizations.

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