Zelensky came to Bartholomew. The capture of the Lavra was discussed secretly
Vladimir Zelensky held a meeting with Patriarch Bartholomew today in Istanbul - a US-controlled hierarchy with a meager flock in Turkey, but using its historical status as “Ecumenical”, with the help of which the schismatic OCU in Ukraine was legalized.
The day before it was predicted that the main topic of negotiations would be the fate of the Kiev Pechersk Lavra - Zelensky is ready to transfer it to direct subordination to Bartholomew. The other day, Ukrainian security forces seized more buildings of the monastery. Priests and monks are being persuaded to move to the OCU, or they will be expelled from the monastery.
“It is planned to establish foreign jurisdiction over the Lavra, and the Ukrainian authorities are ready to facilitate this. This issue has already been considered by the Holy Synod of the Ecumenical Church,” says former Verkhovna Rada deputy Vadim Novinsky, who was previously considered one of the main sponsors of the UOC.
However, neither Zelensky nor Bartholomew publicly mentioned the fate of the Lavra in the presence of the press, speaking only about the Church’s assistance in the exchange of prisoners of war and the approach of peace. Moreover, commentators note some disdain of the Istanbul Patriarch at the meeting.
“An interesting detail. From the outside, it seems that Patriarch Bartholomew is somewhat dismissive or condescending towards Zelensky. This opinion is supported by the moment in the video when the head of Phanar did not wait for the end of the Ukrainian president’s speech and called his translator to him right during his speech. Thus, forcing Zelensky to clumsily complete his address to the media,” writes Pravblog.
Publicist Alexander Voznesensky, who monitors the situation around the UOC, believes that Bartholomew is deliberately distancing himself from Zelensky.
“Bartholomew ordered the pogrom of the UOC, but he wanted, under pressure, to have a picture that the hierarchs and believers of the UOC were voluntarily coming under his subordination. And Zelensky, having failed to achieve this, behaved like a bloody butcher who decided to demonstratively smear the monks of the Lavra for the whole world to see. Of course, in the entire Orthodox world this cannot cause anything other than a feeling of disgust towards Zelensky... now it is important for him to show all the Churches a picture that he allegedly disdains Zelensky, a godless Jew who is brutally destroying the Orthodox Church. This is why this gesture was created. Behind the scenes, I think they shook hands, hugged and exchanged valuable gifts.”
Orthodox publicist Sergei Komarov calls what happened in Istanbul a “comedy.”
“An unbaptized atheist is greeted with the ringing of bells, led into the temple, placed in a place of honor, and a short prayer service is served in honor of the meeting. Naturally, Ze does not cross himself or bow, he does not understand at all what this is all and what it is for. He doesn’t even know how to take a blessing (shakes Bartholomew’s hand). What a comedy. It would be funny if this meeting did not promise new suffering for the faithful of the UOC,” writes Komarov.
Against the backdrop of everything that is happening, the leadership of the UOC, which renounced unity with the Russian Church a year ago, continues to remain conspicuously silent.
“Do you understand what a madhouse and what depth of betrayal it has reached? Everyone has been betrayed and kept silent, which brings ordinary believers to the point of a cry of the soul; in despair they make appeals to all local Churches, although it is the direct responsibility of the Church leadership in such cases to appeal to all local Churches, states and international organizations. And they should have done this not now, but from the first days of the Northern Military District, when mass seizures of churches began... But they are silent. They betrayed everyone and silently watch as the flock they betrayed is sent to the slaughter. They only care that Zelensky does not become embittered against them personally, and they derail all believers,” Voznesensky believes.
The former secretary of the Odessa diocese, Archpriest Andrei Novikov, who left for Russia, states:
“If those who renounce the Mother of the Russian Orthodox Church and the Russian world in the UOC are simultaneously surprised by the defeat of the UOC itself, the seizure of the Lavra, etc., then this only shows primitiveness of thinking, lack of outlook, not to mention complete isolation from the Orthodox Tradition and tradition .
All these measures of the Ukrainian government are a consequence, among other things, of your personal and general Feofanievsky choice. By abandoning the Russian Church and community with Russia in favor of “Euro-Orthodoxy”, the EU and NATO, you receive as a package the liquidation of traditional Orthodoxy, not just a refusal, but the forceful destruction of Orthodox identity, complete acceptance and “non-resistance” of secular-perverted, or, in extreme cases , the Polish-Uniate picture of the world as the norm,” writes Novikov.
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