Editor’s Note [at the Kyiv Post]: As Ukraine gets set to inaugurate its sixth president on May 20, the Kyiv Post is asking Ukrainians and those with Ukrainian ancestry who live abroad to send in their pictures (horizontal mug shots, please) with answers to the following three questions for publication. Please keep responses brief — no more than 200 words for each answer or 600 words in all. Include contact details for verification as well as full name, occupation and country of residence. A selection of respondents will be published periodically before Volodymyr Zelenskiy is sworn in as president. Send responses/photos with the subject header “Ukrainian Voices From Abroad” to Kyiv Post chief editor Brian Bonner at bonner@kyivpost.com.

Giacomo Sanfilippo

As I noted previously on these pages, the remarkable fact that three-fourths of a predominantly Orthodox Christian nation should cast its vote for a Jewish candidate over against an Orthodox incumbent serves as a clarion call—in a very positive way—for the newly organized Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU) to adopt a more appropriate paradigm for church-state relations than the imperialist model inherited from centuries of Russian occupation. My advice to the OCU has been to work with government toward creating a more just society where all citizens and visitors feel welcome, regardless of religious affiliation, ethnic origin, language of preference, socioeconomic status, political persuasion, sexual orientation, gender identity, etc.

My advice to Zelenskiy is to respect and work with the deep religiosity of the vast majority of his constituency, not only Orthodox but also Jewish, Muslim, Greek-Catholic, Roman Catholic, Armenian Apostolic, and Protestant—all of the faith communities represented by the All Ukrainian Council of Churches and Religious Organizations (AUCCRO). Take the initiative to meet and enter into sustained dialogue with them, not only one on one with the individual religious bodies but with the AUCCRO as a group. Enlist them as allies in the pursuit of social justice and the common good for all Ukrainians. Assure them that their support for liberalizations in the social sphere will not infringe on their doctrines and practices within their own communities of faith. Read More

Kyiv Pride. June 2016. (Radio Free Europe)

On May 14 UNIAN reported that Ukraine ranks 35^th out of 49 European countries on an index of LGBTQ rights and protections. The methodology for creating this ranking is described at ILGA Europe, while the full list of countries and rankings is found on its Rainbow Europe page. Rainbow Europe is funded by the European Union.

With the refreshing exception of Greece—which fares at #14 even better than such countries as Germany, Ireland, and Iceland, and where the Pew Research Center reports among Orthodox Christians an unexpectedly high rate of acceptance of homosexuality in general and same-sex marriage in particular—majoritarian Orthodox countries fall predictably low on the list. Yet Montenegro at #22 and Georgia at #24 score higher than Switzerland at #27 and Italy at #34. Russia lands with a thud fourth from the bottom at #46, surprising no one. Only Armenia, Turkey, and Azerbaijan score worse. Read More

In 2018-19, Ukraine made the news again when President Petro Poroshenko announced that Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople would grant a tomos of autocephaly to the Orthodox Church in Ukraine. Poroshenko’s prediction came true, and the events of autocephaly introduced the world to a deep and embittered battle for authority and power over Ukraine’s Orthodox Church. As religious experts hastened to describe the geopolitical implications of autocephaly and theologians interpreted the scene as a battle between Constantinople and Moscow, numerous questions surfaced. Who has the authority to grant autocephaly in the Orthodox Church? Do Orthodox Ukrainians want to be separated from Moscow because of the war in Donbas? Why are the Orthodox churches in Ukraine divided, and who is to blame for the schism? Are radical Ukrainian nationalists responsible for the autocephaly movement?

My book, The Orthodox Church in Ukraine: A Century of Separation, presents and analyzes the complex history of the autocephalous movement in Ukraine from 1917 to 2016.  Based on extensive archival research, my study examines the dynamics of church and state that complicate attempts to restore an authentic Ukrainian religious identity in the contemporary Orthodox Churches. An enhanced understanding of these separate identities and how they were forged could prove to be an important tool for resolving contemporary religious differences and revising ecclesial policies. Read More

In The patriarch has no clothes on January 26, I laid out for the readers of the Kyiv Post [and for the readers of Orthodoxy in Dialogue here] the ecclesiastical irregularities of allowing 90-year old egomaniac and former KGB agent Filaret Denysenko to retain the title of “Patriarch” and the silly hat that goes with it in the Russian (not Ukrainian) tradition. To restate the obvious, there has never existed—at any time in the history of the Orthodox Church—a canonically recognized “Kyiv Patriarchate” or “Patriarch of Kyiv.” In granting autocephaly to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU) on January 5-6, 2019, the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople expressly designated the Ukrainian Church by its historical status as a “metropolitanate,” and its primate by the historical title of “Metropolitan of Kyiv.” Denysenko’s patriarchal fantasies remain unrecognized by anyone anywhere in the Orthodox Church outside of his diminishing circle of sycophants.

The OCU has itself to blame for this mess. Not only did they permit Denysenko to retain the title of “Patriarch,” but made him a full member of the Holy Synod and ruling bishop of the Diocese of Kyiv—thus ensuring that he continue to be called not only Patriarch, but Patriarch of Kyiv. In this fanciful capacity he continues to function as senior to Metropolitan Epiphanius, the rightful highest ranking bishop of the OCU. It was Denysenko who first congratulated President-elect Zelensky on behalf of the Ukrainian Church following last month’s runoff election. Indeed Denysenko seems to ignore Metropolitan Epiphanius’ existence entirely. Read More