Why He Has to Apologize Yet Again
Why the Pope's gesture of Ukraine-Russia reconciliation has angered many followers
The 'come on guys, shake easily and get along' statement ignored the fact Russia was the articulate antagonist and Ukraine the victim
Pope Francis has offered no shortage of kind words for the beleaguered people of Ukraine. He has decried the "cruel and senseless" war inflicted on them, blamed the invasion on an unnamed "potentate" and prayed for peace.
The situation is directly relevant to his flock, after all, the pontiff being the spiritual leader of the Ukrainian Catholic Church building, including its 130,000 Canadian members.
But two events in the midst of a traditional Easter celebration terminal week have left ethnic Ukrainians worldwide suddenly incensed with the Pope, and raised questions about whether a neutral call for peace is advisable amid an unprovoked state of war of aggression.
Francis'south relationship with Ukrainians was "shaken to its core" in detail by the Vatican's Way of the Cross procession through Rome'south Colosseum on Good Friday, say critics.
The Church had a Ukrainian and a Russian adult female hold the cross during the procession, accompanied by a text that stressed peace and reconciliation between peoples — but made no mention of who had started the war and prosecuted it so brutally.
It was a "come up on guys, shake hands and get along" statement that ignored the fact Russia was the clear antagonist and Ukraine the victim in a disharmonize that's still raging, says Rev. Michael Kwiatkowski, chancellor of the Ukrainian Catholic Archeparchy of Winnipeg. He called the matter "disheartening."
"Ukrainians did not want to hear a less-than-supportive vox from the spiritual leader of the Cosmic Church," he says. "They were gravely injure that the Holy Male parent would exist willing to preside over a world prayer event that could cast doubt over what was really happening in Ukrainian towns and cities."
And so, on the aforementioned day, the Vatican's Kyiv administrator and a central from Poland met with the main Ukrainian leader of the Russian Orthodox Church, which has acted every bit sort of a spiritual cheerleader for the invasion.
The future of the Ukrainian Cosmic Church — an autonomous grouping that considers the Pope its ultimate head — may even be in jeopardy as a consequence, suggests a Canadian academic and church member.
"It's painful for this to happen, and at Easter," says Lubomyr Luciuk, a political geography professor at the Royal Armed forces College. "I get it, he's the Pope, he's supposed to preach peace, he's supposed to preach reconciliation. Merely this is a war that Ukrainians didn't start and information technology'southward happening right now. People are being murdered, people are existence raped, people are beingness forced from their homes…. It's the wrong time."
Most religious Ukrainians observe the Julian calendar, meaning Sunday, April 24 is their Easter.
A spokesman for the Papal nuncio in Canada, the Vatican'due south ambassador hither, could not be reached for comment.
But Father Antonio Spadaro, Jesuit priest and editor of the journal La Civiltà Cattolica, strongly defended the pontiff in an Italian newspaper, stressing that the Pope views the war through the "language of Jesus," which means loving one'south enemy and praying for one's persecutors.
"I thing needs to be understood: Francis is non a politician, he is a pastor," wrote Spadaro in il manifesto.
"Francis acts co-ordinate to the evangelical spirit, which is one of reconciliation fifty-fifty against all visible hope during this state of war of aggression," he said. "His chief interest is not geopolitics but — as he said three days after the outbreak of the war — 'ordinary people, who desire peace and that in every conflict are the real victims, who pay for the follies of war with their own skin.'"
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Nevertheless a week afterwards, the incidents take left a lingering bad gustatory modality for some Ukrainians and their supporters.
The Pope rightfully sees himself every bit a peacemaker but peace without justice is an affront to the victims, said Mychailo Wynnyckyj, a Waterloo, Ont., native and sociology professor at Ukraine's elite National University of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy.
"We interpret it every bit the equivalent of saying a rapist and a victim must reconcile," he said. "The rapist needs to repent first. If y'all don't do that, you are perpetuating an injustice."
Underlying the most recent controversy is the Pope'due south overall narrative about Moscow'southward invasion. He has condemned its boorishness toward Ukrainians and fabricated allusions to Russian federation and President Vladimir Putin as the aggressors, but never mentioned them by proper name.
Then came the Good Fri events, most prominently the Way of the Cross procession, meant to recall Jesus's march toward crucifixion. The 2 women — ane Russian, ane Ukrainian — were friends who worked at a Rome hospital. The text that was supposed to accompany their participation asks God to "teach us to be peacemakers, brothers and sisters," while again making no reference to which people or country started the disharmonize.
Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, head of the Ukrainian Catholic Church, caught wind of the program beforehand and protested, calling it untimely, ambiguous, incoherent and "even offensive" to his members.
Most of the text was left out of the anniversary merely the two women still held the cantankerous, and each other's hand.
We interpret it as the equivalent of saying a rapist and a victim must reconcile
The same day, the Papal Nuncio in Ukraine and Catholic Central Konrad Krajewski of Poland paid an official visit to Metropolitan Paul of Vyshhorod and Chornobyl, de-facto caput of the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine. His superior in Moscow, Patriarch Kirill, has been a staunch supporter of the state of war and, some believe, provided its ideological underpinning: The notion that Ukraine is just part of a single Orthodox nation with Belarus and Russian federation, the state of war a righteous fight between Western decadence and traditional values.
The Russian church posted a photo of the three clerics on its website and quoted the Pope's representative as condemning "restrictive actions" confronting any church during the conflict.
Wynnyckyj said the Good Friday events were widely seen equally "a slap in the face to Ukrainians" for the sake of outreach to Russian religious leaders deeply involved in Putin's state of war effort.
It's reminiscent of Pope Pius XII, who drew criticism for maintaining the Vatican'due south neutrality through the Second World War and the Holocaust, he said.
Meanwhile, the Ukrainian Catholic and Ukrainian Orthodox churches take begun early talks most a possible merger. If Pope Francis hoped that a potential unified church would fall under the Catholic banner he'due south now made "a massive pace in the incorrect direction," said Wynnyckyj.
• Email: tblackwell@postmedia.com | Twitter: tomblackwellNP
Source: https://ottawacitizen.com/news/world/why-the-popes-gesture-of-ukraine-russia-reconciliation-has-angered-many-followers/wcm/8c31f525-7d86-4f3b-852d-56a0b5af2ae3
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