Ambassador to the Vatican: Unification of OCU and UGCC needs specific steps

Andrei Yurash and the Pope. Photo: facebook Andrei Yurash

Ukraine's Ambassador to the Vatican State Andrei Yurash, who previously headed the Department for Ethnic and National Policy and Religions of the Secretariat of the Cabinet of Ministers and one of the initiators of the Tomos, said that the process of uniting the UGCC and the OCU needs specific steps.

Yurash told about this in an interview with Glavcom. Asked whether it is possible to unite Ukrainian Greek Catholics and Orthodox Christians, the Ukrainian Ambassador to the Vatican noted that “any unification initiatives are good.”

“If we are talking about the OCU and the UGCC, then the leaders of both churches have said many times that they are committed to dialogue, and their strategic goal is to unite and return to the original unity that existed in Ukrainian Christianity since the Baptism of Rus by Vladimir,” said Yurash.

In his opinion, the unification of the OCU and the Uniates is “a complex process, which is very often difficult to implement in everyday practice and the life of churches. This requires concrete steps. Everything here will depend on the communities themselves."

Earlier, the UOJ wrote that the leader of the Ukrainian Uniates, Sviatoslav Shevchuk, spoke about the plan to unite the UGCC and the OCU.

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