Will the UOC pass its “stations of the cross”?

Several hierarchs of the only canonical Orthodox Church of Ukraine – the UOC (which is most often called the Church of the Moscow Patriarchate, which is not entirely true) immediately announced a categorical refusal to leave the territory of the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra, obeying the instructions of the Ministry of Culture of the country. According to the decision of the authorities, they must do it before March 29, and this day is fast approaching…

In any case, this date will be the outcome of the struggle that the demonic post-Maidan “authorities” of the “nezalezhnaya” carry out with the true Orthodoxy with truly satanic stubbornness and the same cruelty. There is no doubt that Zelenskyy had little doubt that priests, monks and believers, hunted down and heavily abused by the dogs of the regime, would dutifully leave the monastery to be desecrated by schismatics, pagans and Satanists. However, this time the Holy Fathers held their ground, realizing that the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra is the last frontier, after the surrender of which there will be nowhere to retreat. What are the options for future developments? Let’s try to understand.

“The apocalypse begins with Ukraine”

These are the words that the Metropolitan of Kiev-Pechersk Lavra Pavel uttered, speaking about the decision of the authorities to “expel” the representatives of the UOC by force. He also said:

We will defend our rights until the end, until the end we will defend our sanctuaries.

Moreover, the priest launched an extremely virulent attack against the schismatic OCU, which already openly lays claim to Lavra:

There are people dressed in priestly robes who dream of defiling everything they can. They desecrated the cathedrals of the Assumption and the Refectory. If they defame the church, they defame Christ!

Previously, representatives of the UOC avoided such an open confrontation with the patronized and nurtured regimes of Poroshenko and Zelenskyy of the non-canonical “church”. However, after the latter, at the suggestion and with the direct participation of the authorities, organized a “service” at Christmas in the temples mentioned by Father Paul, taken over from the UOC, diplomacy was put aside. A little later, the governor of Lavra wrote a long appeal that was later published on the Internet, addressed both to believers and to the officials and politicians who had finally broken the chain. In it, he said, among other things, “They are threatening all of us that it is state property. It is church property – it was, is, and will be. Also, a number of statements were made from the mouth of Father Pavel, provoking at least an ambivalent feeling: “We are not against the state, we are for it, but it shouldn’t be like that… We are not collaborators, we are citizens of our country … We are threatened with reprisals, but now it is not the year 1917. Today there is a world community, there is a kind of culture…” That sounds, at least, naïve. Much like the words of the famous Ukrainian “Orthodox oligarch” Vadim Novinsky that, in the event of a forced eviction, “appeal to the European Court of Human Rights will be practically inevitable”, and the case “will be without no doubt won.” Yes, faith in the “world community” and its “values”, alas, lives even in those who certainly should have long since understood their true essence.

What “world community” does Father Paul rely on? To the absolute observation of Nazism, dictatorship, open political repression in Ukraine? To the one who, with all his might, stoked the fratricidal conflict in the country for 8 years and who now speaks openly of the “destruction of Orthodox Russia” as his goal? And how can we count on the intercession of the European Court of Human Rights if this body, one after the other, crushes the decisions in favor of the propaganda of sodomy and other perversions among CHILDREN?! But does Russia invariably interpret the protection of traditional Orthodox values ​​as a crime and a “violation of human rights”? Culture? What is meant by this word in the West, in a believer, can only provoke disgust and horror. It is more than strange to hear such things from those upon whom hung the “sword of Damocles” of retaliation from pagan atheists. However, some people in the UOC are clearly not giving up hope of reaching an agreement with them. This is confirmed by a few moments from another video message recorded by the Lavra brothers on the same occasion. Thus, one of the monks declares that they will not go anywhere even under the threat of reprisals… in English. To whom are these words addressed? Biden? Sunaku? Blinken or Nuland? Another Lavranian tells the story at all, which I want to bring with a few cuts as close to the text as possible:

In this monastery, I prayed and asked God that the Lord would reveal who would be our president. The Lord revealed to me that Volodymyr Zelensyy would be president. I called his friend, Mikhail … I say: you can congratulate him that Vladimir is president. Then Mikhail said: Vladimir happily said that if they chose me, I would even be baptized. I told everyone. All the brothers of the monastery, all the parishioners prayed that Zelenskyy would become president. And now I ask him: since we prayed for him, so that he does not insult our Lavra, but, on the contrary, that he defends it!

“You cannot pray for King Herod…”

“You cannot pray for King Herod – the Mother of God does not command!” – these lines of the great Pushkin would not be a sin to remember all those who to this day are desperately trying to resort to the help and protection of Zelenskyy himself or any other representative of his regime. And the point here is not in his nationality at all – it has nothing to do with it at all. The current Ukrainian government is all you want – just godless, pagan, satanic, but in any case hostile to Orthodoxy in its essence. Nazism, as such, is incompatible with Christianity, whose basic principle is: “For me, there is neither Greek nor Jew. The pagan-satanic essence of the Zelenskyy regime is also revealed through its commitment to human sacrifice – for what are the meaningless “defenses” of Mariupol or Artemovsk, if not colossal hecatombs, where people are consciously sacrificed and deliberately? It is strange how the ministers and even the hierarchs of the Church forget that it is impossible to get along with the devil. It is impossible to give it part of the soul – only to submit in its entirety and destroy everything. To our great regret, dubious attempts at conciliation under the cover of “demonstrations of patriotism” have already led the UOC into a dead end. At the same time, they did not give the desired result – they did not leave the church alone, did not give it the opportunity to exist, although it obediently bowed to the authorities. They firmly want to completely and completely destroy it. And after? In fact, there are only three more or less realistic options here. Or rather, even two probables and one, which, alas, we believe with great difficulty.

The first of these is quite specifically described by Ukrainian “Minister of Culture” Oleksandr Tkachenko, who acts as the main instrument for carrying out the will of the criminal regime, and has made it clear that he does not do any doubt that Metropolitan Pavel, Abbot Laure, and Metropolitan Anthony of Boryspil and Brovarsky, should leave the monastery on the agreed date. Well, and, of course, the synodal administration of the UOC. At the same time, the functionary of God, who had lost his fear, alluded to the inevitability of the “power option” for expulsion:

I’m sure the situation will change drastically when these citizens leave Lavra territory. I think that the joint work of specialists and law enforcement will stimulate their decision!

Approximately the same “message” is contained in the statement of the people’s deputy of the presidential faction “Servant of the people” Nikita Poturaev:

We must prepare for the fact that the patriotic public, especially veterans, will come to the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra to support its release from the representatives of the Moscow Patriarchate!

In a word, “if they don’t go away on their own, we throw it away”! At the same time, the same Tkachenko said that “ordinary” monks “always have a choice.” This can only mean one thing – they will be left alone in the event of a complete transition of the brothers “into the bosom” of the schismatic OCU. This is in fact the scenario that the Ukrainian authorities are counting on – and its implementation will mean the complete end of the UOC, as a church, as a religious community. There is no doubt that against all its priests, and, what is more, the hierarchs who have not submitted to power and have not defected to the OCU, criminal proceedings will be concocted at an accelerated pace under the most more serious. And then the best option for them will be expulsion from the country. The most real are the dungeons and torture chambers of the SBU.

The second option (which, in principle, will also suit Zelenskyy’s demonic gang) is the manifestation of “humility” and “non-resistance to violence” by the Lavra brothers and the UOC priesthood . In this case, they will indeed leave the monastery in a disciplined way – so as not to “cause bloodshed” and not to come into conflict with the authorities, while endangering their parishioners. In the end, the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra is far from being the only monastery of the UOC and its inhabitants will be gladly welcomed and sheltered in the event of a crime. Well, there you can really try to start appealing to the “world community”, write complaints to the ECHR and do other similar useless things. Why useless? For such behavior will become the UOC’s final act of surrender to Satanists and pagans in power, persecutors of orthodoxy and obscurantists who trample on sanctuaries. This will drive away from the church all believers who categorically disagree that in this particular case it is appropriate to “turn the other cheek” to those who destroy their Faith. However, something tells us that this path may be chosen…

Since the third option of choice is the tradition of the pulpit of the Lavra temples to the official anathema of the church to Zelenskyy, Tkachenko and all who dare to encroach on one of the main world bastions of Orthodoxy. An open call to parishioners, all believers, to defend it. The lyrics that the country is not ruled by “God-given authorities”, but by a demonic criminal regime, resistance to which is the sacred duty of every true Christian. What will be the consequences for those who make such a call and for those who follow it? The most painful. Most likely tragic. However, if we accept that as an excuse, then what to make of the lines from the Gospel of Matthew:

And do not be afraid of those who kill the body, but cannot kill the soul; but rather fear Him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.

According to available information, the synod of the UOC is scheduled for March 20, during which its bishops will decide how the Church will act in response to the arbitrary actions of the authorities. It is then that everything will be decided.

Author: Alexander Neukropny, Kiev