Ukrainian Church complex seized by Russian authorities (10/05/97)

Ukrainian Church complex seized by Russian authorities

by Roman Woronowycz
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV - Buildings of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Kyiv Patriarchate complex in the city of Noginsk, just outside Moscow, were seized and the archbishop of the Moscow eparchy detained by the Russian militia and Security Services in the evening of September 29. Church leaders in Kyiv are calling the action the result of the new law on religion that Russia's President Boris Yeltsin signed on September 26.

Nearly 100 worshippers and clergy were beaten and arrested, including Archbishop Adrian, the leader of the UOC-KP in Russia, after militia and Security Service officers entered the grounds of the Epiphany Cathedral, according to the Kyiv Patriarchate's press office. Archbishop Adrian sustained a broken arm in the skirmish that ensued.

The press office said the militia seized the Church's cathedral, its seminary, a convent for nuns and the monastery, but refrained from comment on the status of the archbishop and followers until a press conference that was scheduled for October 2.

However, Nikolai Marfenko, chief of the Noginsk police precinct that includes the Epiphany Cathedral, said there were no violent altercations and that the cathedral itself was left alone. He told the Associated Press that a bailiff with 10 policemen sealed off several buildings occupied by the Kyiv Patriarchate on orders of the Moscow regional arbitration court. He explained that he did not know the reason for the order.

In Kyiv, the Rev. Dymytryi, secretary to Patriarch Filaret, said the action is a direct result of the new law on religion that President Yeltsin just signed, which severely limits the activities of any Church or religion that has not been registered with Russian authorities for at least 15 years.

Father Dymytryi said the Russian Orthodox Church is using the new law to settle scores with the Kyiv Patriarchate, which broke with the Russian Church not long after Ukraine declared independence in 1991. "That law allows them to act this way because under the law nobody but the Moscow Patriarchate has a place in Russia," said Father Dymytryi.

Gleb Yakunin, a prominent Russian religious activist and a defrocked Russian Orthodox priest, issued a statement on September 30 that supported Father Dymytriy's assertion. According to a report filed by the Associated Press, the critic of the Russian Orthodox Church said the aim of the law is "to pressure the religious competitors of the Moscow Patriarchate."

Relations between the Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Kyiv Patriarchate and the Ukrainian branch of the Russian Orthodox Church, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Moscow Patriarchate, have been strained since the Kyiv Patriarchate broke with Moscow in 1992. They have been characterized by fights, sometimes physical, over church property and parishes, and verbal sparring.

The two sides seemed to have reached a truce in July when the two, along with other confessions in Ukraine, signed a memorandum of agreement in which they agreed to work together to resolve the various conflicts that surround the religious denominations of Ukraine and to jointly celebrate the 2000th anniversary of the birth of Jesus Christ.

The Kyiv Patriarchate is saying that the Moscow Church has used the memorandum to further its agenda, which is to retake control over the Orthodox faithful of Ukraine. A statement issued by the Kyiv Patriarchate on September 30 read: "Is it only a coincidence that this criminal action took place after the killing of Volodymyr Katelnytsky, the head of the Kyiv organization, the Brotherhood of the Apostle St. Andrew, after the so-called Aleksei-Bartholomew rendezvous in Odesa, after attempts to blow up St. Feodosius Monastery in Kyiv and the seizing of parishes that have occurred after the signing of the memorandum on the non-acceptance of the use of force in inter-confessional relations?"

Mr. Katelnytsky, the director of the St. Andrew Brotherhood, was found murdered in Kyiv in August, a crime that has not been solved. Four kilograms of explosives were found on the grounds of the St. Feodosius Monastery, which is the only church in the Pecherska Lavra complex in Kyiv that belongs to the Kyiv Patriarchate. The Moscow Patriarchate retains control over the rest.

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