OCU cleric: UOC priest joined us to escape army recruiters
Roman Hryshchuk said Vasyl Kovtash decided to leave the UOC after being taken to a TRC and asked for help getting out.
OCU cleric Roman Hryshchuk, who oversees the "transfers" of UOC communities in Bukovyna, acknowledged that Fr. Vasyl Kovtash agreed to join the OCU after ending up at a Territorial Recruitment Center (TRC). Hryshchuk made the admission during a livestream on his social media page while commenting on Fr. Vasyl's return to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.
According to Hryshchuk, he had spent a long time trying to persuade Kovtash to switch jurisdictions, but the priest repeatedly put off making a decision. That changed when Kovtash called him from Khotyn.
"Father Roman, I'm ready to transfer now. Just help me get out of the TRC," the OCU cleric quoted him as saying.
Hryshchuk claims he did not help Kovtash get out of the TRC but merely announced the priest's intention to join the OCU, after which "a decision was made" allowing him to leave the UOC. The OCU cleric did not explain how Fr. Vasyl managed to get out of the TRC if Hryshchuk had played no part in securing his release.
Hryshchuk went on to complain that Kovtash never truly became "one of their own" in the new organization. He did not attend events or conduct funeral services for fallen soldiers and eventually stopped serving at the parish in Rynhach altogether. According to Hryshchuk, Kovtash had been assigned to an established parish that "he had neither built nor developed."
The OCU cleric attributed Fr. Vasyl's decision to return to the UOC to financial self-interest, speculating that he had been promised "a good parish" abroad. At the same time, Hryshchuk acknowledged that he could not describe Kovtash as an ideological supporter of the OCU.
As a reminder, Fr. Vasyl Kovtash issued a public statement of repentance, acknowledging that his decision to join the OCU in 2024 had been a mistake. The priest also apologized for his harsh social media remarks, which had fueled hostility among Orthodox Christians, and expressed regret for his actions.
Roman Hryshchuk himself is known as one of the leading organizers of forcible takeovers of UOC churches in Bukovyna and repeated provocations against believers. Recently, Hryshchuk compared clerics of Dumenko's organization to TRC personnel and complained that the state was shifting responsibility for conflicts during UOC church takeovers onto OCU clergy without providing them with any support.
Earlier, the UOJ examined whether those who joined the OCU to get out of a military recruitment center should be condemned.
