A civil war may break out in Montenegro
Thousands of supporters of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Montenegro will take part in a protest rally in Niksic on Saturday against a new law on religion that involves the expropriation of Orthodox churches.
BalkanInsight writes about this, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
“Civil war could happen... people will not allow churches in Montenegro to be stolen and desecrated,” Bishop Amfilohije warned in an interview with Bosnian television channel FTV.
He said he would put the relics of the revered Saint Basil of Ostrog on public display, again calling on the government to withdraw the controversial law.
The head of the Serbian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Irinej, on Wednesday called on the Montenegrin government to withdraw the law, saying it was trying to rob the Serbian Church by taking away more than 650 churches.
“They should refuse to accept the law... we hope and pray that they will surrender and that our saints will not be in danger,” Irenaeus told daily Kurir.
In response, Montenegro Prime Minister Dusko Markovic said on Wednesday that he would not withdraw the law, regardless of whether it received Church approval. He also said that on December 24 he will be in parliament to discuss the law.
In July, the Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church called on the Montenegrin authorities to “refuse the [planned] appropriation of church property.”
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in Moscow on Wednesday that Moscow hopes Montenegro will not jeopardize the rights of the Orthodox Church when considering the law on freedom of religion.
“This topic goes beyond national borders and touches on the issue of the unity of the Orthodox world, the preservation of its pillars, which have been formed over centuries,” Zakharova emphasized.
The Serbian Orthodox Church is the largest denomination in multi-ethnic Montenegro, but its relations with the country's pro-Western government have always been poor.
The government considers the church hostile to the country's independence, and generally too pro-Russian and pro-Russian. The church accuses the government of constantly trying to undermine it and strip the country of its Serbian heritage.
The bill provides that all churches and monasteries built before December 1, 1918, when, according to the new official historical propaganda, the “occupation” of Montenegro took place (this is how the country now officially interprets its annexation to the kingdom of the CXC - Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, later Yugoslavia).
Thus, the Montenegrin authorities declared claims to the main shrines of the Orthodox Church, such as the monastery of St. Basil of Ostrog, Cetinje and other monasteries, as well as churches of the Montenegrin-Litoval Metropolis of the SOC.
As in Ukraine, in Montenegro the authorities, with the support of the West, are lobbying for the creation of their own religious structure with a claim to autocephalous status - the Montenegrin Orthodox Church. It is possible that the taken property should subsequently go to her.
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