Monument to Blessed Klymentiy Sheptytsky, proclaimed righteous among the nations by Yad Vashem, destroyed in Russia: Head of the UGCC
We ask those saints and the righteous to pray for the world so that the virus of hatred and war no longer spreads and infects human hearts. His Beatitude Sviatoslav, the Father and Head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, said this in a traditional video message on the 89th week of the Russian aggressor’s large-scale invasion of peaceful Ukrainian land.
Blessed Klymentiy Sheptytsky in prison
The Primate noted that heavy combat was occurring along the entire front line. The epicenter of the confrontation remains the martyrdom of Avdiivka in the Donetsk region, where, according to open resources, nearly a thousand people are killed every day, including Russian soldiers. The world is appalled by the Russian aggressor’s disregard for the lives of even its own people.
According to the Head of the Church, the other day, there was an attempt to attack the Khmelnytsky nuclear power plant from the air. The cities and villages of Ukraine shudder every night from strikes from various types of weapons.
“But Ukrainians believe in victory,” said His Beatitude Sviatoslav, “so today we once again want to say to Ukraine and the world: Ukraine stands! Ukraine fights! Ukraine prays!”
According to the research of international institutions, the spiritual leader said the number of killed and wounded children in our country is increasing every day. As of today, it has been recorded that 1,646 children have died in Ukraine. These are only those we know about and whose deaths have been officially registered. About 1,138 have been injured of varying levels of severity. Almost 1,800 went missing. Unfortunately, neither their parents nor relatives have any information about them. And 200,000 were forcibly deported by the Russian occupiers, having been abducted from their Ukrainian parents. Today, we remember in prayer the children of Ukraine who are crying and suffering.
The Primate noted that the virus of hatred is infecting more and more nations, including the invader nation. The other day we learned that in Vladimir, Russia, the city of the martyrdom of many righteous people and confessors of the Catholic Church, an inconceivable act of vandalism took place: a monument to the blessed martyr Klymentiy Sheptytsky, who in 1995 was proclaimed a righteous among the nations by the Jewish organization Yad Vashem for saving hundreds of Jewish children during the Nazi occupation of Galicia, was destroyed.
There, in that prison known as the Vladimir Central, he died in 1951. They want to obliterate the memory of someone revered in the world. The memorial plaque of Archbishop Mieczyslaw Reims, a Roman Catholic archbishop from Lithuania, was also destroyed.
On Friday, October 27, at the call of Pope Francis, the whole world united in prayer for peace. Millions of Ukrainians, sons and daughters of our Church, prayed with the Holy Father, with their Church.
The Primate expressed his sincere gratitude to all those who have prayed and fasted and will continue to do so to stop the war from spreading across the world.
The UGCC Department for Information
