With Russian missiles targeting religious sites and occupying forces preventing some churches from functioning, Ukraine’s religious leaders are now raising their voices.

Newsroom (03/11/2023 21:00, Gaudium Press) The United States Institute of Peace organized a debate, entitled “Faith under fire in Russia’s war on Ukraine,” with a delegation from the Ukrainian Council of Churches and Religious Organizations. The Ukrainian Catholic bishops traveled to the United States to shed light on the harsh reality faced by the faithful in Ukraine, raise awareness and emphasize the importance of religious freedom and the preservation of religious heritage.

The Catholic Church in Ukraine is on the brink of possible extinction, predicted the Catholic bishops, who foresee a grim fate like in the days of the former Soviet Union, if Russia emerges victorious from this war. They say that although the majority – more than 62% of the population – is part of the Orthodox Church, the country’s five million Catholics (13%) could be forced underground once again.

In fact, Russia does not have a single lawfully registered Ukrainian Catholic parish. This exposes the lack of religious freedom under the Russian regime and the possibility of the Catholic Church becoming extinct if the repression continues.

In addition, there are the incessant attacks on religious sites in Ukraine by Russian forces. Hundreds of religious buildings, theological institutions and sacred sites have been damaged, destroyed or looted by the Russian military. This systematic destruction of religious heritage is seen as a deliberate attempt to erase Ukraine’s spiritual identity. Since the beginning of the war, approximately 450 places of worship have been destroyed by bombing.

In an interview with CNA, Bishop Vitaliy Kryvytskyi of Kiev-Zhytomyr pointed out that the Russian government has imposed control over religious organizations in its territories and that an even worse fate can be expected for the Catholic Church in Ukraine if Russia wins the war.

“When we ask priests in Belarus and Russia why they don’t take a stand against this war,” explained Bishop Kryvytskyi, “they say: ‘You don’t understand us because you’ve forgotten what it was like to live in the Soviet Union’.”

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Compiled by Florence MacDonald