Deacon's Advocate

The Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate (UOC MP) has every chance of avoiding “ban” and “liquidation”

The new season of the series Ukraine against the Moscow Patriarchate has started and it has become clear that in it, in full accordance with the genre, the empire will try to strike back. While bill No. 8371, the one “on banning the UOC MP,” is approaching its second reading in parliament, heavy media artillery is being pulled up from the flanks: Tucker Carlson went to Moscow to let the world “hear Putin,” and the main supporter of the UOC MP, Robert Amsterdam, released a video interview before his visit to Kyiv, which, if you “bleep” all the “persecution-of-the-church” and “this-is-all-illegal” statements, would turn into a half-hour timer.

Bob Amsterdam, a lawyer and lobbyist hired by Vadim Novinskiy, UOC MP deacon and oligarch on the run, is traveling to Ukraine. As he himself says, the intention is to meet with his clients — the Synod of the UOC MP and Ukrainian parliamentarians — in order to convince them not to adopt the law banning the activities of the Moscow Patriarchate in Ukraine. He also intends to meet with “defenders of the church,” including those who were “illegally detained and even convicted.”

As a lawyer, Amsterdam surely understands that the words about “the illegally convicted” are manipulation since he has not yet had the opportunity to study each specific case in detail. However, he knows perfectly well how important it is to say the right word at the right moment. It is important to give the public the impression that everything that is happening is generally “illegal.” And then, it doesn’t matter at all how legal each individual detention or court decision is, since public opinion has already been formed.

Judging by the behavior of Bob Amsterdam himself, no matter what he says about his “admiration” for Ukraine and “deep friendship,” the only thing that really interests him in Ukraine and in connection with Ukraine is the interests of very specific political circles in the United States. Whoever pays him fees (including the sponsors of the Moscow Patriarchate), his real and main customer is not in Kyiv or even in Moscow, but in Washington. The rhetoric of “standing up for Ukrainian Orthodoxy” has become an integral part of the political program of the Republican Party in the US elections. The fact that Bob Amsterdam’s “Kyiv offensive” was announced against the backdrop of the Moscow business trip of Tucker “Voice of Trump” Carlson is a sign that they both are probably acting within the framework of a common media plan.

This foreign policy turnaround is a real gift for the defenders of the Muscovite patriarchy in Ukraine. While media powerhouses do their part, the airwaves are filled with discordant background noise. In Ukraine, Moscow Patriarchate-leaning media act in a wide spectrum — from the offended posture of conventional “liberals” who “stand for Ukraine” and are “against aggression” to aggressive obstruction in the style of “to whom Kirill is not a father, the Holy Church is not a mother.” In other countries, conferences are held and publications are made by respectable experts — mainly from among the “good Russians,” but also Ukrainian “good Moscow Patriarchate parishioners,” who clearly explain the world that the MP in Ukraine is fine, whereas the unified Orthodox Church in Ukraine is nonsense because Ukraine is multinational, multi-confessional, etc. This flow of well-meant idiocy cannot hide the fact that in almost every predominantly Orthodox country there is, as a rule, only one Orthodox Church. Not even the fact of the existence of the one and only Russian Orthodox Church in the much more multinational Russian Federation. From the point of view of Russians (even the best among the good ones), as well as from the point of view of the MP supporters (even the most pro-Ukrainian one), what is due to an empire is not due to its colony. Nothing personal, just business: the interests of the empire always pay better.

Yes, there is money for all this wealth — for conferences and various articles in the European press, for transatlantic travel of loyal journalists and payment for expensive European lawyers, for the arrangement of parishes in the West and support for a whole range of mass media in Ukraine. And most importantly, to maintain the “general line” of one specific religions within the framework of “canonicity,” i.e., in subordination to the Moscow Patriarchate.

Having good sponsors, the leadership of the UOC MP can afford to maintain Olympian calm. The tactic of silence chosen by Metropolitan Onuphriy and Co., albeit having a bad effect on the state of the church entrusted to them, is advantageous from a political point of view. The only problem is silencing internal critics. But the church leadership is coping with this so far.

The main goal of the Moscow Patriarchate in Ukraine is becoming increasingly obvious: to retain everything that is possible, to maintain structural integrity, its presence throughout the territory of Ukraine, in order to continue to call itself “the church of the entire Ukrainian people” in good faith. Oh, sorry, throughout the entire unoccupied territory of Ukraine. Because in the occupied world it is liquidated by its Moscow authorities as redundant — where the Russian world has come physically, there is no need for its symbolic marks.

The refusal of the UOC MP to compromise with the Ukrainian authorities and the decision to “sit out” turned out to be a reasonable strategy. The Ukrainian government began its church campaign in its usual extravagant style — without the necessary preparation, thorough work with personnel and any long-term program. The capabilities and skills of the authorities in the church issue turned out to be very limited. To make matters worse, the authorities initially did not (and still do not) have clarity about whether it is worth pursuing the matter to the complete abolition of the structures of the Moscow Patriarchate in Ukraine.

A year after the first anti-MP statements, any “church policy” of the Ukrainian government is nowhere to be found. It does not exist. There is only some activity on the part of the Security Service of Ukraine (SSU). But the latter also turned its struggle with the Moscow Patriarchate in Ukraine into a small show designed to support the positive image of the “God Service Ukraine” (a popular nickname of the SSU). Don’t laugh, that’s what they call it in church circles. Jokingly, of course. But this is the case when many a true word is spoken in jest. In both the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU) and the UOC MP, the solution to church problems is increasingly entrusted to the SSU and less and less so to the church itself. Appeals to the SSU, which will “figure it out,” “come and put things in order,” “will take care of you soon,” or “visited us and found nothing,” is perhaps the main trump card in recent church discussions. The SSU has no objections. It “covers itself with glory” where it costs it almost nothing: it conducts searches, after which it presents to the heated public a worn-out brochure about the life path of Patriarch Kirill.

The main potential beneficiary of the liquidation of the Moscow Patriarchate in Ukraine — the Orthodox Church of Ukraine — as it turned out, also has very limited capabilities in ousting and replacing competitors. Even against the backdrop of a full-scale war with Russia. Even with support from the state and state-owned television channels. Why this happened and whether it could have been different is another question to which there is no short answer. Lack of qualified personnel, inability to counter propaganda, poor control of the situation on the ground and, finally, financial difficulties all played their part. In general, the church should examine its failings. Or rather, to begin with, recognize them — which for the current leadership of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, as for most of us, is the most challenging and painful part of the work.

This should be done as soon as possible because time is no longer on the side of the OCU. The prospect of the complete liquidation of the Moscow Patriarchate in Ukraine — at least quickly, “surgically” — is becoming more and more vague by the day. Even the bill “to ban the UOC MP” looked, to put it mildly, not like a scalpel, but like a bag of expired antibiotics. Its next edition — “amended and supplemented” under the pressure of circumstances, “Western partners” and upcoming changes in world politics — may turn out to be similar to the palliative care protocol.

In other words, in the near future we will return from the rhetoric of “ban” and “liquidation” to “dialogue.” It doesn’t matter what it’s about — unification, mutual recognition or some other forms of coexistence. It doesn’t matter because the purpose of this dialogue will not be reflected in its title and program. This will not be a dialogue about how we can organize spiritual life in Ukraine. Its sole purpose will be to mark the “demarcation lines” between Ukrainian Orthodoxy and the Moscow Patriarchate. Moreover, these lines will pass through our territory and our interests — both national and spiritual — just as it has been for the previous three decades.

The fact that the UOC MP, its fate, structure, scale and capabilities would be a bargaining chip, was clear from the very beginning of the full-scale war — just as the fact that every day, without visible progress in Ukrainian church politics, the part of the pie that will ultimately have to be given to the Moscow Patriarchate increases. Of course, the UOC MP will emerge from this “dialogue” with great losses — some part of the church went (and will still go) to the OCU, something else had to be sacrificed to its Moscow Master and Father (love of this kind constantly requires sacrifices, including blood). Nevertheless, the UOC MP will not be allowed to completely sink into oblivion or even become a marginal structure — as long as Ukraine exists as an independent state, Moscow will need the UOC MP.

 

PS.

After Kateryna Shchotkina’s article was published in ZN.UA, the American lawyer Robert Amsterdam sent a letter to the editorial office, expressing his disagreement with some of the author’s value judgements:

'Shchotkina claims that I am somehow in cahoots with Tucker Carlson. I deny in the strongest terms possible that Carlson has any bearing on my work. I am an independent lawyer and there is no coordinated media plan between me and Carlson. I provided him with an interview as part of my work defending the UOC. Since then, I have spoken to numerous outlets across the media spectrum.

That Carlson chose to interview Putin is enirely unrelated to the UOC and its fight for survival. Likewise, my defence of the UOC has nothing to do with Republicans in the United States. That senators and congressmen – Republican and Democrat – are raising concerns about religious freedom in Ukraine is beyond my control. I act for one party alone, and that party is the UOC.

Now regarding the claim that I am funded by the Moscow Patriarchate. In no way do I receive money from the Russian Orthodox Church. Indeed, to do so would be a serious breach of ethics and US, UK, and EU law'.

In the coming week, the advocate of the UOC MP is planning his visit to Ukraine, giving us all a chance to form an opinion on the ends and means of his actions.

Read this article in Ukrainian and russian.