Russian Orthodox Church

The Dispatch

Pope Francis on Ukraine’s Russian Orthodox Church ban: ‘Churches are not to be touched!’

August 26, 2024 Catholic News Agency 18
Pope Francis greets the faithful gathered in St. Peter’s Square on Aug. 25, 2024. / Credit: Vatican Media

CNA Staff, Aug 26, 2024 / 11:09 am (CNA).

Pope Francis on Sunday sharply denounced the Ukrainian government’s recently enacted ban on Russian Orthodox Church worship, arguing that the faithful should not be barred from worshipping as they please.

The new Ukrainian law, which passed the country’s Parliament on Aug. 20, bans the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukrainian territory. The measure comes roughly two-and-a-half years after Russia invaded Ukraine in a major escalation of the two countries’ ongoing conflict. 

The new law further encourages religious organizations in Ukraine, including the Moscow-aligned Ukrainian Orthodox Church, “to break the existing ties with the Russian state,” according to the parliamentary news agency.

In his Angelus address on Sunday, the Holy Father said he has been “thinking about the laws recently adopted in Ukraine,” which he said causes him to “fear for the freedom of those who pray.”

“[T]hose who truly pray always pray for all,” the pope said. “A person does not commit evil because of praying. If someone commits evil against his people, he will be guilty for it, but he cannot have committed evil because he prayed.” 

“So let those who want to pray be allowed to pray in what they consider their Church. Please, let no Christian church be abolished directly or indirectly,” Francis said. 

“Churches are not to be touched!” he added.

The Ukrainian Parliament’s news agency alleged last week that the Russian Orthodox Church has “become a de facto part of the state apparatus of Putin’s criminal totalitarian regime.”

The church “is used by Russia to justify and support aggression against Ukraine and Putin’s insane policies in general,” the state agency claimed. 

Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, the head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, last week defended the new law, arguing that the Russian government has used the Orthodox Church “as a tool of militarization.”

The new law aims to offer protection against ideology and narratives being pushed about Ukraine being part of the “Russian world,” the archbishop argued.

[…]

No Picture
News Briefs

Pope Francis greets Russian Orthodox metropolitan after audience

May 3, 2023 Catholic News Agency 2
Metropolitan Anthony, chairman for external church relations of the Russian Orthodox Church, greets Pope Francis after his weekly general audience in St. Peter’s Square on May 3, 2023 / Daniel Ibañez/CNA

Rome Newsroom, May 3, 2023 / 06:15 am (CNA).

Pope Francis greeted the chairman for external church relations of the Russian Orthodox Church after his weekly public audience on Wednesday.

The brief encounter in St. Peter’s Square with Metropolitan Anthony comes amid heightened scrutiny of diplomatic signals involving the Holy See’s desire to broker a peaceful settlement to the ongoing fighting in Ukraine.

In his press conference Sunday on his flight back to Rome from Budapest, Pope Francis told reporters that the Holy See is involved in a secret peace mission to end the conflict. Both Ukrainian and Russian officials were quick to deny that negotiations were taking place, but a close papal aide confirmed the pope’s statement in an interview with an Italian news outlet published Wednesday.

In the livestream video of the May 3 general audience, Metropolitan Anthony, 38, could be seen approaching the pope and shaking his hand. Francis kissed the bishop’s pectoral cross. The two spoke for just under one minute and exchanged small gifts.

Pope Francis has wanted to meet with the leader of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, since the start of the full-scale war in Ukraine. A planned meeting between the two leaders in Jerusalem last summer, which would have taken place during a trip to Lebanon, was canceled.

On the second day of his trip to Budapest, Hungary, April 28-30, the pope had a private meeting with Russian Orthodox Metropolitan Archbishop Hilarion. During his in-flight press conference April 30, the pope commented on meeting Hilarion, saying he is someone “for whom I have much respect, and we have always had a good relationship.”

“Hilarion is an intelligent person with whom one can talk, and such relationships must be maintained, because if we talk about ecumenism, we can then say ‘I like this, but I don’t like that …’ We must extend our hand towards everyone, and also accept the extended hand of others,” he said, according to a Vatican transcript of the press conference. The metropolitan was also present at Francis’ Sunday Mass in Budapest.

Metropolitan Anthony, chairman for external church relations of the Russian Orthodox Church, walks with Monsignor Leonardo Sapienza, regent of the Pontifical House, in St. Peter's Square on May 3, 2023. The metropolitan had a brief exchange with Pope Francis after the pope's general audience on May 3, amid heightened scrutiny of diplomatic relations between the Holy See and Russia. Daniel Ibañez/CNA
Metropolitan Anthony, chairman for external church relations of the Russian Orthodox Church, walks with Monsignor Leonardo Sapienza, regent of the Pontifical House, in St. Peter’s Square on May 3, 2023. The metropolitan had a brief exchange with Pope Francis after the pope’s general audience on May 3, amid heightened scrutiny of diplomatic relations between the Holy See and Russia. Daniel Ibañez/CNA

Pope Francis also said during the in-flight press conference that he has only spoken once with Kirill since Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022. The two spoke, he said, for 40 minutes over a Zoom video call.

He also said that Metropolitan Anthony, who replaced Hilarion as chairman for external church relations, “comes to see me.”

“He is a bishop who was a pastor in Rome and knows the situation well, and through him I am in contact with Kirill,” he added.

Anthony was a clergyman in Rome from 2011-2019.

Responding to the pope’s comments about secret talks, an official in the Ukrainian presidential office told CNN on May 1 that he was “not aware” of a peace mission. “If there are talks, they are taking place without our knowledge,” he said, according to CNN.

According to TASS news agency, a spokesman for the Kremlin, Dmitry Peskov, said Tuesday that Russia also “has no knowledge” of this mission.

However, economist Stefano Zamagni, until recently the president of the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences, has reportedly confirmed the veracity of Pope Francis’ comments about a peace mission.

Zamagni, thought to be a close advisor to Pope Francis, was quoted in the Italian newspaper Il Fatto Quotidiano on May 3 saying, “the pope has been working continuously for peace for more than eight months. But it’s no surprise: It is obvious that both the Kremlin and Kyiv deny it because there is still no official document.”

The economist said the Vatican is carrying forward a seven-point plan for the peace process he outlined last September.

[…]