photo: reuters.com
Metropolitan Sviatoslav Shevchuk, the head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, which is eastern in style, calendar, and ritual but part of the global Roman Catholic Church, is invited Pope Francis to visit Ukraine. According to him, the visit will help the country achieve peace in times of threat from Russia, Suspilne reports.
Read also: Pope Francis might visit Ukraine next summer. What has to happen first
Metropolitan Sviatoslav stated that we should not expect ideal conditions, and the visit may take place even under the current circumstances.
«We have repeatedly expressed our wish that the Holy Father visit Ukraine. We invited him and often repeated the invitation,» – the Metropolitan said.
According to him, such a visit would be a very important gesture in the eyes of all mankind.
Read also: Pope Francis: «I want to assure my dear Ukraine in my prayers»
«In Ukraine, there is a consensus not only among Catholics but also among Orthodox and even non-believers that Pope Francis is the most important moral authority in the world today,» – Sviatoslav Shevchuk added.
«People say that if the Pope comes to Ukraine, the war will end. They perceive the gesture of the papal visit as an envoy of peace,» the statement said.
It will be recalled that the Pope’s previous visit to Ukraine took place 20 years ago and lasted for five days. On 20 June 2001, Pope John Paul II visited Lviv and Kyiv.
Read in the article about the procedure that precedes the Pope’s visit to a country and how this process is organized.
For reference:
Greek Catholicism, the majority religion of Lviv, Ukraine, is a Christian confession which acknowledges Catholic doctrine and is in communion with the Pope, but maintains Eastern rites and rituals, including married priests. It emerged in 1596, when a part of the Orthodox Church recognised the supremacy of the Pope. Later, the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church (UGCC) became mostly localised in the Western Ukraine, becoming one of the markers of the national identity for the region’s population during Austrian, Polish and Soviet rule.
Currently, Kyiv is the center of Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, under the jurisdiction of His Beatitude Sviatoslav Shevchuk, major archbishop of Kyiv-Galicia, and it is present in many regions of the country, though Galicia, where Lviv is, still remains its bulwark. It also has a strong presence among the Ukrainian diaspora, especially in parts of Canada, the United States, and Australia.
Translated by Vitalii Holich
You can read a Ukrainian language version of this story here.
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