Some of Ukraine's Orthodox churches want to break away from their Russian patriarch
SARAH MCCAMMON, HOST:
An earthquake in the Orthodox Christian world. That's what some of the faithful say the war in Ukraine has triggered. Ukraine has several denominations of the Orthodox Church. One of them follows a bishop in Moscow - or followed, that is, until the Russian invasion. NPR's Lauren Frayer reports from western Ukraine.
LAUREN FRAYER, BYLINE: On the day that Russia invaded, the Church of St. George in western Ukraine posted a sign on its front gate...
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: Condemning Russian war.
FRAYER: ...Condemning Russia, which is pretty out of character because this church belongs to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate, as in it follows a bishop in Moscow.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: We are saying, God bless, at the entrance.
FRAYER: I thought this church would be empty when I stopped by for Sunday services. It's hard to find anyone in Ukraine these days who owns up to ties with Russia. But I was wrong.
Oh, my God. It's packed. I can't even find room. It's amazing.
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL GROUP: (Singing in non-English language).
FRAYER: Worshippers are crammed in shoulder to shoulder - women in lace head coverings, children squeezing through our legs, the smell of candles, the glow of a chandelier illuminating hundreds of icons of saints. They're here to pray...
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL GROUP: (Singing in non-English language).
FRAYER: ...And also to witness something extraordinary. When bearded, golden-robed priests carry bread and wine to the altar, they normally invoke the name of their bishops in both Moscow and Ukraine. But today...
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: (Speaking non-English language).
FRAYER: ...They refuse to say the Moscow bishop's name. It might sound like a small liturgical change. But for Orthodox Christians...
NICHOLAS DENYSENKO: I would call it a serious earthquake in the Orthodox world.
FRAYER: Nicholas Denysenko is a theology professor at Valparaiso University in Indiana.
DENYSENKO: There were many Orthodox churches that stayed on Russia's side or kind of were waiting to see what was going to happen with that, and some church leaders are outraged at what they're seeing.
FRAYER: They're outraged, he says, at the failure of their patriarch in Moscow to denounce this war. Instead, in his sermon Sunday, the Russian Orthodox patriarch Kirill defended Russia's invasion...
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
KIRILL: (Speaking Russian).
FRAYER: ...And said it had to do with gay pride parades in Ukraine. Some Ukrainian churches have already broken away from Moscow over the years. And now Mykola Danilevich, a spokesman for all the remaining Ukrainian churches that are still allied with Moscow, tells NPR...
FRAYER: (Speaking non-English language).
FRAYER: ...That he plans to ask church leaders for independence from Moscow. It's a change that would affect more than 5 million Ukrainians. Cyril Hovorun is an Orthodox priest who worked in Moscow advising the patriarch. Not only did the Russian church back Vladimir Putin's war; it helped justify it, Hovorun says, with bogus claims that Orthodox faithful were being persecuted in Ukraine and Russia needed to step in.
CYRIL HOVORUN: I saw this ideology in its cradle, and I was really terrified.
FRAYER: He says he tried to warn the Moscow patriarch as early as 2010 that if he backed Putin, he could lose his Ukrainian churches. But he says the church did not listen.
HOVORUN: Many people in the Orthodox world, not just in Russia - they see Putin as new Orthodox emperor.
FRAYER: Hovorun is now calling for his own fellow priests to face justice for collaborating with Putin.
UNIDENTIFIED MUSICAL GROUP: (Singing in non-English language).
FRAYER: Back at the Church of St. George, some of the older parishioners are not convinced, though.
HELENA MIKOLAYVA: (Speaking non-English language).
FRAYER: I still think the Moscow patriarch is a godly man, says Helena Mikolayva, who's worshipped here for 40 years. Others denounce Moscow but say this is confusing at a time when they need their spiritual community most.
KSENIYA KOTYK: Kseniya.
FRAYER: Kseniya.
KOTYK: Saint of Petersburg.
FRAYER: Kseniya Kotyk is another worshipper here who is named after a Russian saint.
KOTYK: She gave her life to Christ.
FRAYER: She says she no longer respects the patriarch in Moscow, but she can't separate her faith from his country.
KOTYK: One of the most important in your life is to have strong roots.
FRAYER: With your spiritual family, she says. But that family of Orthodox churches in Russia and Ukraine is now fractured by war. Lauren Frayer, NPR News in Lviv, Ukraine.
(SOUNDBITE OF MODEST MOUSE SONG, "BLAME IT ON THE TETONS")
Copyright © 2022 NPR. All rights reserved. Visit our website terms of use and permissions pages at www.npr.org for further information.
Accuracy and availability of NPR transcripts may vary. Transcript text may be revised to correct errors or match updates to audio. Audio on npr.org may be edited after its original broadcast or publication. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.