Don't be like a deputy prime minister
After the ban on the UOC, Deputy Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk stated that it is necessary to stop the "influence of the hostile Russian Church" (meaning the UOC) on Ukrainians not only in Ukraine but also abroad.
She implied that wherever Ukrainians are abroad, there "should be our Ukrainian Church" (meaning the OCU).
Why did we pay particular attention to this statement? After all, there have been many similar statements from the authorities in the last 24 hours.
Firstly, it is striking in its incompetence, as the provisions of the Tomos prohibit the OCU from overseeing Ukrainians outside the country.
Secondly, Vereshchuk surprised with a sudden 180° shift in her "church" stance.
In 2022, she was prepared to participate in a procession with the UOC to Mariupol alongside Metropolitan Onuphry. At that time, she clearly did not consider the UOC a "hostile Russian Church".
In 2019, Vereshchuk even made shocking statements. She referred to the Tomos of the OCU as a "conflict factor", "pure politics" and a pre-election technology of Poroshenko. She claimed that Ukraine has had the Tomos since the 1990s.
"We have the Tomos from Patriarch Alexy. Why are we only now and only in this manner talking about it?" Vereshchuk asked on television.
Perhaps, many have noticed that in life there are outright and principled enemies, and there are "weathervanes" that waver with the "party line". The situation with the Church is the same. In the Rada, there are Poroshenko and his aides from "EU", and there are "servants" who recently supported the UOC but now act according to the Soviet slogan, "The Party says – we must! The Komsomol replies – we will!"
It is these people who now appear particularly wretched.
