Aug 10 (Reuters) - Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy pledged on Saturday to “strengthen our Ukrainian spiritual independence”, suggesting that the country’s leadership was moving towards effectively banning the branch of the Orthodox Church that has links to Moscow.
A majority of Ukrainians are Orthodox Christians, but the faith is split into one branch with traditional links to the Russian Orthodox church and an independent church, recognised by the world Orthodox hierarchy since 2019.
Membership of the independent church loyal to the Kyiv patriarchate has swelled since Russian troops invaded Ukraine in February 2022. But the minority Moscow-linked church retains influence and Ukrainian leaders accuse it of abetting the invasion and trying to poison public opinion.
“I have just held a meeting – a preparatory one – regarding a decision that will strengthen our Ukrainian spiritual independence,” Zelenskiy said in his nightly video address.
Taking people’s religion away from them is a very difficult thing to do. I assume the critical part here is “with ties to Moscow”.
Yeah, it says the Russian Orthodox is separate from the larger Eastern Orthodox Church, and they’re a minority in Ukraine compared to the other Orthodox Christians. So I don’t think it’s going to be a big deal. Hopefully they just target bishops or whatever and change a few signs, and don’t really mess with people’s individual churches and priests.