The Church is offering hope to the country’s beleaguered population amid a “very dangerous escalation” in the Ukraine crisis said Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, the leader of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church on Friday. He was speaking at an online event marking eight years of conflict in the Eastern European country, organized by the pontifical foundation Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) on 4 February.
“We feel that we are on the edge of a very dangerous escalation of the military aggression against Ukraine,” said Shevchuk, who has led the largest of the 23 Eastern Catholic Churches in full communion with Rome since 2011.
“It is true that Ukraine has been attacked by Russia already eight years long. But the escalation which we have right now is not a simple continuation of the war in Donbas or the continuation of, or consequence, of the annexation of Crimea. Right now, there is something very different.”
“We are facing full-scale escalation between Russia and the collective West. I mean, Russia and NATO countries, specifically the United States. And in this conflict, in this escalation, Ukraine is only part of the full panorama of different threats and tensions.”
The 51-year-old major archbishop said that the possibility of a large-scale Russian invasion was taking a psychological toll on Ukraine’s 44 million population.