Repression-conscious govt claims to honor victims of political repressions
Today, on the third Sunday of May, Ukraine commemorates the victims of political repressions.
We honor the memory of all those people whom the Soviet government tortured in prisons, rotted away in the Gulag, starved, and executed in the basements of punitive bodies.
Today, President of Ukraine V. Zelensky laid flowers in Bykivnia, where the remains of victims of the Soviet regime rest, and posted a message on his official Telegram channel that included the following words:
"Today we honor the memory of millions of people who were killed by the totalitarian system. Humiliated, repressed, tortured. Deprived of their true destiny. Talents taken from our nation. Broken lives that could have done so much more for future generations."
"Humiliated… Broken lives… Deprived of their destiny…." But isn't this about the Orthodox journalists sitting in the Lukyanivska prison, awaiting life sentences? Isn't it about Valeriy Stupnitsky, Andriy Ovcharenko, and Volodymyr Bobechko, whose destinies are already being shattered by the Ukrainian authorities?
"Talents taken from our nation…." Isn't this about Metropolitan Arseniy of Sviatohirsk, imprisoned for his preaching, taken away from his numerous flock by the Ukrainian authorities?
"…who could have done so much more…." Isn't this about Archpriest Serhiy Chertylin, who was transporting funds to buy a resuscitation vehicle for the front but couldn't do so because the Ukrainian authorities threw him in prison and confiscated his money to never return it?
A frightening fact of our reality is that there are political prisoners in Ukraine today, prisoners of conscience who ended up behind bars not even for their political beliefs but for their faith, the Orthodox faith, which our people have professed for a thousand years.
Yes, the scales are different, and the level of cruelty is not yet the same. But the Bolsheviks didn't build the GULAG overnight either. Maybe it’s not worth following the path once taken by the Soviet communists?
