UOC-MP ban is closer than it seems, officials hint
21 August 13:42
The Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate may be recognized as affiliated with the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC). In this case, the state will file a lawsuit in court to terminate its activity. This was told on the air of the telethon by the head of the State service of Ukraine on ethno-politics and freedom of conscience Viktor Yelensky.
UOC-MP under investigation
In May of this year, the Ukrainian government approved a mechanism to check religious organizations for their ties to foreign church structures that are banned in Ukraine, as well as a procedure to establish the facts of using these organizations to spread the ideology of the “Russian world.”
The UOC-MP filed a lawsuit against this decree, but despite it, in late May, a specialized state agency began checking the church for its possible links with banned foreign religious organizations.
In early July, the State Ethnopolitics Committee announced that it had found evidence of links between the UOC-MP and the Russian Orthodox Church, the functioning of which is banned in Ukraine.
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They will not fulfill the requirements
In mid-July, the agency issued an official demand to the church to eliminate violations of religious legislation by 18 August and simultaneously published a list of religious organizations belonging to the structure of the UOC-MP or having ties with it.
Subsequently, the UOC-MP sent an official letter to the state service explaining its vision of the church status and stated that the state requirement is an interference in church affairs and is not subject to fulfillment.
What the state will do
According to Viktor Yelensky, if the church fails to meet the state requirements by August 24, a decision will be made to recognize the Kyiv Metropolitan Church as a structure affiliated with the Russian Orthodox Church. And then the case will go to court.
“The second step is a lawsuit in court to terminate the Kiev Metropolitanate of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. These are the steps that are dictated to us by law.”
– emphasized Elensky and in passing noted that the court proceedings may end faster than the UOC-MP expects.
UOC-MP
The Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate is a church-administrative structure on the territory of Ukraine, which received its modern status in 1990. According to canon law, it is actually a representation of the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine, although it officially calls itself autonomous. The organization is the successor of the Ukrainian exarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church, which existed since 1921. The UOC-MP was historically formed as an instrument of Moscow’s religious and political influence on Ukrainian lands.
Structurally, the church includes numerous dioceses, parishes and monasteries throughout Ukraine, with a significant number of believers and clergy. It is headed by Metropolitan Onuphrius, who formally has the status of Primate of an autonomous church, but depends on the decisions of the Moscow Patriarch. In the register of religious organizations, the UOC officially does not have the prefix “Moscow Patriarchate”, but the state examination showed that it is a structural subdivision of the Russian church.
After the start of full-scale Russian aggression against Ukraine in 2022, the status of the UOC-MP became the subject of fierce debate. Years of repression and the current war have shown that rf uses the church and religion as a tool of political influence. In 2024, the Ukrainian parliament passed a law banning the activities of religious organizations affiliated with the russian Orthodox Church, which created legal grounds for the termination of the UOC-MP in Ukraine.
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