The Ukrainian parliament has passed a law allowing the banning of a church with links to Russia. The new law should give judges more opportunities to act against religious organisations with links to Russia.

The new law must make it easier for the Ukrainian authorities to shut down a church if it has connections to Russia, Pravlife writes. The State Service of Ukraine for Ethnic Policy and Freedom of Conscience is to determine these connections. If the Service finds any ties, the religious organisation has 90 days to break them. If not, it will be banned in Ukraine.

The new law allows judges to ban especially, among others, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. That church has links with the Moscow Patriarchate and is officially headed by Patriarch Kirill who fervently supports the war. According to the Ukrainian government, the church is also linked to the Moscow government. The church has denied the latter.

The law has been in the making for some time. In the parliament, the Verkhovna Rada, 265 out of 450 members, finally agreed to it. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has yet to sign the law. It is expected that the law will come into force 30 days after publication.

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The Ukrainian Orthodox Church is one of the largest Orthodox denominations in Ukraine. However, since the invasion, some individual parishes broke off the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and joined the other Orthodox denomination in Ukraine, the Orthodox Church of Ukraine.

The Ukrainian Orthodox Church, in general, has also issued several statements in which it condemned the support for the Russian invasion of Patriarch Kirill and the Russian Orthodox Church. In the latest statement, published on August 17, the church, for example, writes: “We categorically condemn activities of the Russian Orthodox Church, which has become an accomplice to the Russian invaders’ bloody crimes against humanity, which sanctifies weapons of mass destruction and openly declares the need to destroy Ukrainian statehood, culture, identity, and, more recently, Ukrainians themselves.”

Despite attempts to distance itself from the pro-war rhetoric of Patriarch Kirill, who even called the war holy, the church has been unable to break all its ties to Russia. From an Orthodox view on the church, it would be difficult to cut the affiliation with the Patriarchate since this connects the church with the World Orthodoxy. A local Protestant church can claim to be a “true church of Christ”, whether it is connected to any synod or other congregation or not, but from an Orthodox view, that is simply impossible. The legality of the sacraments would be questionable (as would be the forgiveness of sins implied in the sacraments). In Orthodox theology, the sacraments are the core.

This article by Joe-Lize Kruijsse-Brugge was first published by CNE.news and re-published with permission.