Russians Unhappy about Papal Visit to Ukraine

The Vatican Communications Department never ceases to amaze.  A case in point is its press release today about the Pope's visit to Ukraine in June of this year.

It seems that the whole purpose of the trip (Operation: Moscow Placation) is about to unravel.

The Russian Synod of Bishops has just appointed (read "told") Metropolitan Vladimir of Kyiv of the Moscow Patriarchate to write a letter to the Pope to dissuade him from travelling to Ukraine.

Some progress can be noted, however, as the Vatican has, for the first time since the papal trip was announced, called a "spade a spade" by acknowledging that the "Ukrainian Orthodox Church" represented by the Metropolitan is really the "Russian Patriarchate at Kiev."  (And now if they can only work on the proper spelling of "Kyiv" . . .).

Ever so understanding of the Russian position, the Vatican flatly states that:  "Some Orthodox leaders fear that a visit by the Bishop of Rome would trigger an explosion of the inter-confessional conflicts which have tormented Ukraine for more than a decade, and which now form a knot of interests difficult to unravel."

Those interests are the churches that the Russian Orthodox took from Ukrainian Greek-Catholics in 1946.  "Predictably," the Orthodox have been reluctant to part with the buildings they have owned for five decades.  Also, it is stated that "Orthodox leaders" claim that Ukrainian Catholics should rightly be part of the Orthodox Church, not the Catholic Church.

The number one faux pas of the Catholic analysis of the entire religious situation in Ukraine is its refusal to acknowledge the important aspect of Russian religious-cultural colonialism and hegemony with respect to the Ukrainian Orthodox and Catholic Churches.

To deny this fact is to fail to fully understand Orthodoxy as a whole - not that the West appears capable of doing that any time soon.

Roman Catholic geopolitics (why not call a spade a spade?) has always suffered, I believe, from the problem of what can be called "religious internationalism."  Separation of Church and State is one thing, but when has the Church, local, regional and universal, ever been above its own national-cultural perspectives?

The relations between the Latin and Byzantine Churches have always been tainted by aspects that derive not from any purely theological grounds, but from cultural differences.  

Both Rome and Constantinople, have, in their own ways, been historically guilty of imposing their culturally determined spiritual perspectives on other national and local Churches. 

For example, much of the earliest recorded Kyivan Church history was written from the Greek perspective that coloured the conclusions.  The Antiochian Church was obliged to receive the liturgical tradition of Constantinople, jettisoning its beautiful Liturgy of St James.  The same is true of the Georgian Church. 

In the West, the Celtic, Gallican and Mozarabic Rites were suppressed in favour of the Roman Rite and so on.

This did not prevent local Churches from preserving as much of their local religious heritage as possible.  They also worked to fuse the genius of their local cultures into their Christian expression as well.

Thus, Orthodoxy in the Kyivan Church is of a markedly Ukrainian flavour.  The same is true in Russia and other lands.  There is simply no such thing as a monolithic structure called "Orthodoxy."

Although the Vatican would like to think otherwise, Roman Catholicism has followed much the same path.  The Catholic Church in Poland is definitely Polish and the bishops there work in lock-step motion with the interests of the Polish people (I am jealous . . .).

And whenever the rulings of Rome seemed to go against these interests, the Polish Kings of the past never hesitated to formally leave communion with Rome and stay in schism until Rome changed its mind.

One scholar calculated that throughout its 1,000 year Catholic history, Poland has been separated from Rome for about 200 years over various religious and political differences with the Vatican!

In the United States, the Hispanic and African-American Catholics have developed, truth be told, their own special "Rites" that reflect their particular cultural identity and traditions. 

Years ago, they even petitioned Rome to create Patriarchates for them.  (The answer was "No" in case anyone was wondering.)

In New Orleans, Louisiana, the French Acadians who emigrated there from Canada refused to use any language other than French. 

This forced the Irish and the Germans to build their own Catholic Churches since, as one Irishman once put it, "At the Cathedral of St Louis, God only speaks in French!"

So much for Catholic internationalism . . .

This is why it is difficult to understand why certain Vatican circles think of the church situation in Ukraine as a "knot of interests difficult to unravel."

We are not talking about a "Gordian Knot" here!  The "Orthodox leaders" are clearly Russian church leaders who have yet to unravel their religious convictions from their Great Russian colonial interests with respect to the Ukrainian Churches and Ukraine as a whole.

The issues of church property and whether or not Ukrainian Catholics should belong to the Orthodox Church are important ones.

However, they should and will be decided by Ukrainians and in Ukraine.  It is not up to the Moscow Patriarchate to decide these issues for them. 

Ukraine has broken away from Russia.  So have the Ukrainian Churches.  It is time for Moscow to acknowledge contemporary reality in this respect.

It would appear that it is also time for the Vatican to do so as well.

It should begin by stopping its historic approach of trying to establish close ties with Moscow (in the selfless interests of ecumenism, of course) through the Ukrainian people (e.g. Brest-Litovsk, 1596).

The Ukrainian people, both Catholics and Orthodox, are now masters of their own churches, nation and fate. 

They deserve to be treated with respect as independent people struggling to overcome the impact of years of repressive colonial rule and hegemony. 

It was Alexander the Great who unraveled the famous knot of his time using the direct approach of his sword hand.

The martyred, yet undaunted, soul of the people and Churches of Ukraine have a sword, too, the Sword of the Spirit. 

In the end, it is that Sword that will definitively cut through any knots of deliberate misunderstanding in their path toward a better future.

Dr. Alexander Roman  alex@unicorne.org