Ecumenical patriarch: Russian Church also responsible for crimes in Ukraine

The Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, Bartholomew I, said Wednesday that the Russian Orthodox Church shared responsibility for the war in Ukraine, but that he stood ready to help in Russia’s postwar “spiritual regeneration,” according to Reuters.

The spiritual head of the world’s Orthodox Christians said Russian authorities were using the Church as an “instrument for their strategic objectives.”

“The church and the state leadership in Russia cooperated in the crime of aggression and shared the responsibility for the resulting crimes, like the shocking abduction of the Ukrainian children,” he told the international conference “Intercultural and Religious Dialogue” held in Lithuania’s parliament.

“Our interreligious dialogue has to focus on ways to resist and neutralize the capacity of the leadership of the Moscow Patriarchate to undermine unity and to theologically legitimize criminal behavior,” Bartholomew said.