In early 2021, ROC clergymen made fun of Ukrainians tortured in the occupied territories. We are talking about the spokesman of the ROCinU, Archpriest Mykola Danylevych, the rector of the Ionian Monastery of the ROCinU, Bishop Ion (Cherepanov) of Obukhiv, and the head of the Myriany NGO, Vasily Makarovsky.
An alert reader has tipped the Spiritual Front of Ukraine about this fact.
On January 24, 2021, the chief of the Myriany NGO published a Facebook post about his visit to occupied Luhansk. In his post, he mockingly and ironically denies any repression of Ukrainian speakers in these territories.
In addition, Makarovsky openly mocks the Ukrainians who were executed or held in the basements across the occupied regions.
It is worth noting that Makarovsky’s mocking post was liked by Bishop Iona and the ROC spokesman.
It is also noteworthy that in his post, Vasily Makarovsky points out that the so-called UOC belongs to the Moscow Patriarchate, although six months later Makarovsky, as the head of the pro-Russian NGO, led rallies against the Moscow Patriarchate’s “forcible renaming.”
In the comments, none of the ROCinU clergymen objected to the name “Moscow Patriarchate.”
According to the SFU reader, this story may explain why the fathers, despite condemning Russian crimes, stubbornly adhere to Moscow Patriarch Cyril.
It seems that all the recent tearful posts by the ROCinU are hypocrisy caused by fear for the future of the organization. Meanwhile, they could treat the crimes that the Russians have committed in the newly occupied territories with cynical humor, as was the case in 2014.
In any case, the situation needs to be clarified by representatives of the Moscow Patriarchate.
Also, the head of the Myriany NGO published more controversial posts. In particular, he mocked the Ukrainian language, campaigned for a pro-Russian party candidate in Kyiv’s mayoral election, denied the Bosnian genocide in Srebrenica, and promoted pro-Russian propagandists Diana Panchenko and Svitlana Kanvedka.
“Perhaps simple reactions to Facebook posts are not worth a separate article. But, in any case, it can help to reveal the characters and motives of the ROCinU leaders a little more widely,” our reader concluded.
