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In Moscow’s Shadow

By Anna Vassilyeva 

The collapse of Communism allowed the Byzantine-rite Ukrainian Catholic Church to emerge—with surprising vigor—after decades of suppression. Almost immediately, Orthodox bishops voiced their fears that the Byzantine Catholics would take over their parishes and their parishioners.

More recently, splits within the Ukrainian Orthodox community have produced three rival groups, each claiming to represent the Orthodox faithful.

The religious turmoil in Ukraine is a source of deep concern for the Russian Orthodox Church, traditionally the patron of the Orthodox community in that country. And from Moscow’s perspective, the scheduled visit to Ukraine by Pope John Paul II in June is likely to make matters still more complicated. 

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Despite the opposition of the bishops of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate to the June visit by Pope John Paul II to Ukraine, the papal nuncio in that country, Archbishop Nikola Eterovic insists that “the date of the visit will not be reviewed.” 

Speaking to Keston News Service in Yalta in February, Archbishop Eterovic confirmed that the Pope “intends to visit Kiev and Lviv.” A spokesman for Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma agreed that there will be no postponement of the papal trip, despite the opposition of Ukraine’s largest Orthodox Church. “There is no way that the date of the visit can be postponed,” Aleksandr Martynenko told Keston from Kiev, adding that John Paul “plans to conduct services in Kiev and Lviv.”

On January 22 the Ukrainian Orthodox Synod, with the agreement of all 42 bishops, approved a written appeal from Metropolitan Volodymyr (Sabodan) to the Pope urgently requesting him to postpone his visit. Archbishop Eterovic told Keston he “regretted” the Synod’s decision to ask for a postponement, but believed “that decision is not final.”

However, opposition from the Ukrainian Orthodox Church shows no sign of abating. “The West has always been notable for its pushiness,” declared Metropolitan Volodymyr’s secretary and adviser, Aleksandr Drobinko. “We don’t insist that the visit should not take place, we are simply asking that it should be postponed until a more propitious time,” he told Keston by telephone from the Kiev Metropolitanate. He explained:

At a time of schism within the Orthodox Church in Ukraine, his arrival could be played as another political card, and the bishops of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate will not be able to meet him during this visit. If, despite an appeal from so many bishops, they do not want to change the date of the visit, it means that there are weighty reasons.

Drobinko insists the Roman Catholic Church is “acting improperly towards Ukraine’s 30 million Orthodox believers.”

A Church divided

Asked by Keston why the Ukrainian Orthodox Church believes the Pope cannot meet his own Catholic flock in Ukraine, Drobinko declared that “the Pope has been invited as head of the Vatican State, but he is traveling as a spiritual personage.” He said the Orthodox Church would raise no objection if the Pope came to the country “simply as a diplomat.”

In defense of the Synod’s decision—and thus of the Orthodox bishops’ belief that a papal visit is inopportune—the Orthodox argue that this visit “will not bring about peace” between the Orthodox and the Eastern-rite Catholics in the western regions of Ukraine but will simply aggravate relations between the two religious groups. 

Moreover, the Orthodox fear “the lack of clarity in the attitude of the Roman Catholic Church toward the schisms” that have split the Orthodox Church in Ukraine. A potential meeting between the Pope and leaders of “schismatic groups”—the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kiev Patriarchate and the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church—would be tantamount to “ignoring the principles of canonical relations between churches” and would constitute “discourteous interference in the internal affairs” of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate, they complain.

Invited by President Leonid Kuchma, Pope John Paul is scheduled to visit Ukraine from June 23 to 27. Martynenko, the presidential spokesman, said that “the Pope of Rome has been invited, above all, as head of the Vatican State and as a state dignitary.” Ukrainian government authorities share the Pope’s belief that his first visit to the country could promote dialogue between the Orthodox communities in the country—a belief that the Ukrainian Orthodox Church summarily rejects.
Metropolitan Volodymyr’s appeal to the Pope echoed an earlier and even harsher letter from the Orthodox bishops insisting that the Pope must put off his visit. That letter, drawn up at a convention of the Orthodox hierarchy in Kiev last December, was simultaneously sent to President Kuchma.

Just as it is protesting against the Pope’s visit, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate also opposes a proposed visit to the country this spring by Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople. A theological commission under Patriarch Bartholomew’s auspices has begun seeking canonical ways toward unification of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Kiev Patriarchate and the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church—the second and third largest Orthodox jurisdictions in Ukraine. Any such unification would cast into question the current status of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate as the leading Orthodox community in the nation. 

Anna Vassilyeva, like the other authors whose stories appear in this Dossier, writes for the Keston News Service. These news stories were originally produced for the Keston News Service and are reproduced here with permission.