Rada approves legal mechanism to join new canonical church

Ukraine’s parliament approved legislation on Jan. 17
to establish the legal mechanism for parishes of the Ukrainian Orthodox
Church-Moscow Patriarchate to join the newly established canonical Orthodox Church
of Ukraine. The measure, which drew 229 votes out of 226 needed, defined what
is a religious community and requires they establish statutes for themselves.
“Any decisions on changing affiliation and introducing the corresponding
changes or additions to the statute are approved at a general meeting of the
religious community,” the legislation said, specifying the quorum at two-thirds
of the community’s members.

The bill was opposed by the Russian-oriented
Opposition Bloc, whose leader MP Vadim Novinsky alleged the legislation was
aimed as “legalizing raids on the church and property” of the Moscow
Patriarchate. The faction submitted amendments to the legislation, which he
said should have stopped the vote but was ignored by Parliamentary Head Andriy
Parubiy.

Zenon Zawada: Novinsky
said the legislation was timed for the president’s re-election campaign, which
is accurate. The entire effort of establishing the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox
Christian church was to mobilize millions of faithful of the Kyiv Patriarchate
(previously unrecognized by Orthodox Christianity) to rally behind the
president for his re-election. As we’ve reported,
the president is also alleged to have used the church’s creation to
rehabilitate the image of his political allies, a view that we find credible.

As part of the president’s re-election effort,
hundreds of parishes throughout the country will engage in the process of joining
the newly created church throughout the next several months. At least 70 have
done so already, said on Jan. 15 Iryna Lutsenko, the president’s representative
to parliament. The physical conflicts that have already begun to eruptwill mobilize both those in favor of the church’s creation and opposed, with
both dynamics working in the president’s favor because we share the widely held
view that he has a tacit political-business alliance with Ukraine’s
Russian-oriented forces.

However, we’ve stressed that the president is playing
with fire. If Russia is able to stoke riots during the elections (similar to
the Yellow Vests in France) or expand its military aggression to Ukraine’s
Russophile southeastern regions, Poroshenko will have given many of these
citizens the impetus to align themselves with the Kremlin-backed forces.