Press Release – February 24, 2023
For Immediate Release
One year of war in ukraine
On this, the one-year anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Orthodox Public Affairs Committee (OPAC) renews its call for an immediate ceasefire and withdrawal of all Russian military and paramilitary troops from sovereign Ukrainian territory. OPAC continues to decry the unchristian support of the war by Moscow Patriarch Kirill Gundayev, and calls on brave Hierarchs, clergy and faithful of the Moscow Patriarchate to resist Kirill’s slavish submission to the Putin regime. The complicity of the Moscow Patriarchate’s leadership in the war crimes being perpetrated in Ukraine remains beyond comprehension. It is clear is that these so called “men of God” are under the control of Putin and his henchmen.
OPAC also calls for unification talks between the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) under Metropolitan Onufry and the Autocephalous Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU), under Metropolitan Epiphanius. Such a union would not only establish a unified national identity for the Orthodox Church in Ukraine, but it would give the UOC canonical standing, since their separation from the Moscow Patriarchate in May of 2022.
In addition to its demand for the immediate cessation of hostilities and the complete withdrawal of Russian forces from Ukraine, OPAC supports punitory measures including trials for war crimes for all who have prosecuted this unjust and horrific crime against humanity.
Truth Lives in Light!
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Media Contact: Info@OrthodoxPac.org