The Catholic Archbishop of Ukraine’s western city of Lviv, Mieczyslaw Mokrzycki, has said it would be “a disaster if the Holy Father were first to visit Russia and only then Ukraine”. It is quite possible, he told the German Tagespost newspaper on 15 July, that “Ukraine’s frontiers would be closed to him if he arrived from Russia”. The Ukrainian people firmly believed that one must devote oneself to the victim first and only then to the perpetrator, Mokrzycki said.
While Ukrainians were very thankful that the Pope had from the beginning accompanied the Ukrainian people with his prayers and appeals, they were less thankful that Francis had first visited the Russian ambassador in Rome and had never to date stated quite clearly that Russia was actually invading Ukraine.
“Not only the Greek-Catholic faithful, but also we Latin-rite Catholics do not approve of all the Pope’s gestures towards Russia, but then perhaps we do not understand his intentions or his policy really well. Let us hope that the Pope has good intentions and with his way of working will soon bring peace to the Ukraine”, Mokrzycki said.
It was now “almost official” that, as soon as he returned from Canada, the Pope would decide when he was coming to the Ukraine – “possibly in August or September – but that he will come is quite certain”, the archbishop said.
Meanwhile the head of the Council of European Bishops’ Conferences has accused Russia of “waging a war against truth” in Ukraine.
“We see a nation of people giving their lives today, since it is better to die than live in captivity with trampled dignity,” said Archbishop Gintaras Grusas, president of the Swiss-based CCEE. The Lithuanian archbishop was addressing a synod of Ukraine’s Greek Catholic bishops, convened in the Polish border city in Przemysl because of dangers from Russian shelling in Kyiv. He said he was proud Europe's Catholic parishes had “lived out their Christian vocation” by responding to Ukrainian refugee needs “with open arms”.
Ukraine's Greek Catholic Church leader, Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, said the killing of 24 civilians in last week's Russian missile attack on the central city of Vinnytsia was a case of “state terrorism”. The attack was one of many missile and shell onslaughts over recent days, as Russia's ex-president, Dmitry Medvedev, warned Ukrainian forces they would face “Judgement Day” if they attacked the Crimea peninsula. President Volodymyr Zelensky, facing serious setbacks in the eastern Donbas region, accused officials from Ukraine's security service and general prosecutor's office of siding with Moscow and suspended the heads of both organisations.
In his Rome Angelus address on Sunday, the Pope said he remained close to the martyred Ukrainian population, struck every day by a hail of missiles, in a war which was driving peoples apart, and killing truth and dialogue. He also urged news media not to relegate the war to their back pages.
However, Russia's Christian faith and military prowess were again defended by its Orthodox Patriarch Kirill in a speech on Monday in honour of St Sergius of Radonezh. “Russia is a powerful state today, and hardly anyone will try to deprive us of our freedom and independence by force of arms – but in our evil age, there are many other ways to crush people, deprive them of their national identity, their faith and sense of patriotism,” the Patriarch told a congregation of church and state representatives.
“Many forces are working today to influence our people and our country in this way, all because we are different. In enlightened Europe, faith in God is banished and educated people ashamed to admit they are believers. But in our country, which has gone through years of godlessness and persecution, Christ's faith is strong in people.”