Mosiychuk: Is the move from Moscow to Constantinople spiritual independence?

Ihor Mosiychuk. Photo: Facebook

Ukrainian politician and public figure Ihor Mosiychuk stated that everything the government is doing under the guise of combating the Moscow Patriarchate (MP) is actually destroying Orthodoxy and is "completely unrelated to establishing its own canonical Local Church." In an interview on journalist Oleksandr Shelest's channel, Mosiychuk, a supporter of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Kyiv Patriarchate (UOC-KP), emphasized that the government is deceiving the people by talking about spiritual independence.

"Is moving from Moscow to Constantinople spiritual independence? If it's about spiritual independence, it should be the Kyiv Patriarchate, not the Constantinople one. Why lie to people? You're creating a Constantinople exarchate, fleeing from Moscow’s lord to Istanbul’s lord, while talking to us about independence?" the politician exclaimed.

He argued that President Zelensky's actions to ban the UOC are not beneficial to him; rather, his approval rating will drop since most of his voters were UOC members.

Mosiychuk also questioned the ethnic background of UOC clergy.

"Everyone is running around shouting 'Moscow priests'. My question is, how did it happen that most of the 'Moscow' parishes are located in Volhynia, Rivne, and Bukovyna? This is Western Ukraine, a rebellious region. And people attend these parishes and don't want to give them up!" the politician said.

Mosiychuk expressed confidence that the government is trying to create a state church and warned against such a move.

"You can't build a state church; it ends badly, even where these projects were successful. It alienates people because the Church is about faith, not about the state. The main goal of all these actions is to turn people away from faith," concluded the former MP.

As reported by the UOJ, earlier the UOC-KP stated that the Tomos from the Patriarch of Constantinople, as highlighted in the publication, brought subordination to the Greek throne.

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