Boryspil, Ukraine, January 21, 2019 – Following Sunday’s Liturgy in Holy Protection Cathedral in Boryspil, His Beatitude Metropolitan Onuphry of Kiev and All Ukraine addressed the faithful, urging them to remain faithful to Christ in the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church and resist the pressure from politicians and schismatics, reports the site of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.
“Today, we are experiencing a responsible amount of time in our country, when God has given us an exam that we might show our loyalty to truth and our love for God, for others, as bearers of the image of God, and that we might tolerate and respect one another,” the beloved Archpastor said.
According to His Beatitude, Orthodox Christians are experiencing severe trials today that not everyone can withstand and endure properly. “Some are embittered, some stagger, going from one ‘camp’ to the other. You know you don’t need to go anywhere; we already have the path that our ancestors trod and we are traveling the same path. We will not turn either to the left or to the right. I am speaking in terms of the faith.”
Moreover, Met. Onuphry reminded that no one but God Himself can rule the Church.
“Now they want to make their churches so that they’re governed by men, not God. If the Church is managed by man, it will not be a Church, it will be a political party,” His Beatitude stressed. “Its existence will last only as long as this policy is be at the top of human, social life. And we have already seen many politicians and political parties who were strong, powerful, economically rich, and it went into history; everything collapsed. But the Church is and will be.”
His Beatitude further stressed that “our task is not to fall away from this holy Church… Not to control it, not to correct it, because God Who created it directs it. What God created has no need of human correction. We should just keep this faith, the Church, and despite any words, promises, etc., we should walk the path that leads a man to Christ, to the truth, to salvation.”
At the same Liturgy, His Eminence Archbishop Abel of the Polish Orthodox Church expressed the Polish Church’s firm stance in support of Met. Onuphry and the canonical Church and against the unilateral actions of Constantinople in Ukraine.
