On the OCU’s “informing” against Metropolitan Theodosiy

The OCU filed a report against Metropolitan Theodosiy. Photo: open sources

The Cherkasy Eparchy of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU) is “deeply outraged” by the lifting of nighttime house arrest for Metropolitan Theodosiy of Cherkasy and has called on “competent authorities to reconsider the case”. Their reasoning is simply shocking – according to the OCU, it is “unacceptable” that the metropolitan is now free to celebrate services wherever he wishes.

Let that sink in – Christians are appealing to state authorities to ban a canonical Orthodox bishop from holding liturgies!

Of course, the OCU claims that the hierarch “openly promotes Russian narratives” and say they are concerned for the “immature minds” of the faithful.

Yet they offer not a single example of such narratives. And that’s no surprise – they don’t exist. What Epifaniy Dumenko and his circle really want is to get rid of a bishop who’s in the way, someone interfering with their ongoing campaign to expropriate churches. In reality, these are the actions of 1990s-style racketeers, doing everything possible to push a “competitor” off their turf.

But the Church is not a business. Calling for the arrest of an innocent man is both vile and disgraceful. And from a Christian perspective – it’s a sign of total unfitness for ministry. A Christian shepherd cannot wish evil upon another. He cannot hinder the celebration of the Liturgy. It’s absurd.

How would we react if a fitness coach told us not to work out, but to lie on the couch eating chips and pastries instead? We’d probably go find a different coach.

And yet in the OCU, these are precisely the kinds of “coaches” and the kind of “training program” on offer. The only question is: what sort of result can one expect at the end of such a program?

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