word worked here in the restoration of the lviv theological academy, the creation of the ukrainian catholic university, lived here until 2012, and then you left ukraine for 10 years, you have almost not lived, but only come to ukraine, and here you are for the first time in ukraine, and during the war. how do you feel about the war in ukraine? and what are your thoughts and feelings now that you are in kyiv for the first time but already for the third time during the war in ukraine? i have been to lviv and western ukraine

twice before. to end this war at any cost the position of such a statement i do not hear from anyone on the contrary , everyone says we have to win we have no other way than to fight for our freedom and these are the principles that we defend and this is impressive, you grew up in north america er, all your childhood

is in the past youth could you have imagined then in your childhood that ukraine would face such a terrible challenge and that the ukrainian people would be able to respond to this challenge in such a way you can say yes and no because no one can fully predict what is such a war as it is being waged against ukraine today, but on the other hand, my parents were the majority, they were born in the 26th year of the 44th year, they were 18 years old, together with their mother, their father, and their family, they left ukraine by themselves, fleeing from the bombs at a time that was inherently much worse, then 7 million inhabitants of the ukrainian lands were killed during the second

world war and my aunt, to whom i seem to be physically similar, she died in the upa. my grandfather was a soldier of the galician army. he lived in three centuries. he was born in 9 in this year of the 19th century died in before 2002. i grew up just with stories about the war and about the ukrainian liberation struggle and about the sacrifice, so it is obvious that this war was not wanted, but some historian i often repeated to my employees keep in mind that there has never been such a long period in ukrainian history without a war and i would say that for me this war is a shock

, but it is not a surprise. thank you, yesterday you were in zarvanytsia and together with his beatitude sviatoslav and with the members of the synod of bishops prayed for the victory of ukraine in this war, and you prayed for victory over the enemy, and his beatitude sviatoslav in his sermon in zarvanytsia, he said very interestingly. i will quote him. he said that the struggle we are waging with our enemy has a spiritual choice, it is a spiritual struggle, an invisible struggle between good and evil, but this phrase said by the blessed sviatoslav is not some good metaphor , we see that the full calls to freedom and gives it was given to us just as he gave his to the church and the people when he demolished the prison of the peoples and here it is, vladyka boris, i maxim cannot help but ask you about the words in

the context of good and evil, that this is not a metaphor, i cannot help but ask you about the words of the pope of rome francis, who said that he does not support president putin, but refused to talk about good and evil in the context of russia's war against ukraine, and i am quoting pope francis, he said here in this war there is no metaphysical good and evil, there is something global with elements that very intertwined i'm just against reducing the complexity to the difference between good and bad without thinking about the roots and interests which are very complex how did you take these words uh i mean how did you take the words uh of pope francis m well you put me in it is not an easy situation, and i will even try

to be as sincere as possible. i think the more the pope gets closer to the circumstances in ukraine, the better he will be able to describe them. with the state in the state by the states in the state secret. so it's one thing to look at the faraway and read about it, and it's another thing to come to bucha to irpin and be in kyiv to see our uh-uh wounded, the printer how uh-huh then the uh-huh dead are increasing and growing every day i had a few naked to communicate with the pope and france, i respect him. i

believe that he is a sincere person. he is not a naive pacifist, but these myths that pervade not only the vatican, but the entire european politician for the past 20 years have watched the events in eastern europe in a reactive way, so what is putin, what they will tell us that we need to turn to the great nuclear longing. i believe that in many countries, particularly in the southern hemisphere, and the pope is from argentina, there are, for example, enough of these traditional anti-american sentiments, and the fact is that pope john paul ii begged the united

the united states did not start the second and the arab american wars in iraq and afghanistan did not bring the results that the americans expected. and at the same time, there were not only hundreds of thousands of deaths, but billions of money spent . i think that not all forces are involved. here it is completely clean , but where did he meet with denys kolyada, this is our graduate, who lived in my house for three years and with myroslav marinovych, for example, how did myroslav ask him do ukrainians have the right?

to defend himself, he says, a person who does not defend himself commits almost suicide, and even more so a country, a state that is supposed to protect innocent people. therefore, the sayings and rhetoric and rhetoric of the pope are evolving . ukraine had an ambassador for two years before the war. ukraine neglected its representation in the vatican. the term of one ambassador just ended. and the second one did not start. in general, i would say that during those years of independence, communication with the catholic church.

no, hmm, it was not at the proper level, er, it was not interpreted seriously. and we are now vladyka boris. i want to ask you about this in the 80s, at the end of the 80s. i know that you wrote from there for er, ivan paul ii from there about the activities of the underground church in ukraine, and are there currently people near pope francis who would give him a competent analysis because it seems that the vatican may not have a person in the curia or people who would give a competent in-depth analysis of that what is happening in ukraine or are there any there are people there, but there are not enough of them, this is one thing, the second thing is

to understand that it is not only relations with the pope, but there is a large apparatus, there are many ministries, there are hundreds of people who work in the apostolic capital, and there it is important that there be a consensus, so that the body of the vatican was understood in detail. unfortunately, the fact is that russia spent a huge amount of money to be present, to make exhibitions of various so -called cultural diplomacy, and this had its impact. but maybe you heard what you think that it was about 10 days ago cardinal e jacket win of switzerland who is responsible for economic relations, spoke

extremely harshly about patriarch kirill, saying that he is a heretic preaching this russian peace, it is simply a church theological ideology of the empire of colonialism, and it seems to me that a couple of thousand intellectuals of the world have already been condemned. unfortunately, not a single bishop of the moscow orthodox church in russia has condemned neither war nor russian peace, but one of the highest e-e representatives of the vatican spoke e-e in the church emergency on gost, and we see what kirill said in an interview last week that's what i said to kirill, you can't be a

servant of her, you know how i brought you to serve the government and the service, then you can't ask this either, these are very difficult things, you know , ukraine and the ukrainian issue are broken out of the centuries- old stereotypes created about us and from myths which are about russia today it is very important to emphasize that ukrainians will never again be slaves of russia we ourselves had to see this delivered sermons in ukrainian, some said that he spoke better than the president of ukraine , leonid kuchma

. in our patriotic parties, there are local criminal oligarchs in lviv who are in our patriotic parties and wave blue and yellow flags, but they have made a living, you know, from illegal alcohol, alcoholic products, and tobacco in vynnyky, for example, and the entire center you know well, after all, very often through the lens of the optics of russia, yes, in the optics that was imposed by a country that is actually much more corrupt than ukraine. in this sense, i want to ask you about the continuation of the question about the pope

about his possible visit to ukraine and everything would be fine if the pope had not said that before that he told the reuters agency that before that he plans to visit moscow, does it not look to you like once again the equalization of good and evil, the equalization of the aggressor and the victim is an attempt to avoid defining where is good and where is evil, what do you say, i think you can be calm, i am more than convinced that there will be no visit to moscow, and it is obvious that now in the course of the year, i can say with some precision, but the fact that the pope has a desire to come to ukraine, i do not i doubt how and when it can happen. i don't

know, but it's important, you know. i would like to tell you that i will speak to you sincerely and i will express myself about it in different countries in different languages. i would like it to be from the vatican. clearer, unambiguous language about some issues, but we are not looking for it primarily in pope and the vatican is the biggest enemy of ukraine, er, we have a whole system. imagine that the ukrainian greek-catholic church has 35 dioceses in the world, 16 of them in ukraine, 19 in different countries, the ukrainian community in the world has positions, has structures, has its own identity where there is a church, in particular, the ukrainian the greek-catholic church has developed all this, the vatican, the vatican

, various things, sponsors thousands of students , came to rome-studios at the expense of the pope, you can say that in the 16th year i had the honor to tell about the pope about the war and the humanitarian crisis, i said, i see, i will speak very briefly, ukrainians need to hear three words from us, from you, they need help, we can help, we won't help 30 seconds, the pope opened the drawer, took out a piece of paper and said repeat, and he wrote it down to himself until one week, the pope's action for ukraine was announced, which collected 17 million euros, but perhaps even more importantly, the pope requested that a catholic parish be held in every parish in europe, a

gathering and a conversation be held about what is happening in ukraine. i think that this was a period, so to speak. please help me understand the situation, but i believe that in the past, during the communist era, when the vatican defended ukraine, when pope john paul ii spoke in ukrainian, starting in 1978 , when various structures of the vatican developed ukrainian structures, you know that a free university in ukraine was sponsored by the vatican, the encyclopedia of ukrainian studies from the 1950s, which was published in sarcel, france, was edited in the center that was purchased for ukrainians by the vatican

, that is, the policy of supporting ukrainians in the vatican there is also a deep one and we will see more new fruits, thank you. i am not asking you to somehow clarify this question, but only because millions of the faithful, yes, millions of the faithful reacted very, very painfully. on that special friday , so when people perceived the introduction of christ by a ukrainian woman as a symbol of non-distinction, the equalization of cain and abel, that's why it was important for me to talk about this with you. and i also want to ask about the provision of the patriarchate as

what is the perspective and how do you see if we--are we expecting or will we see signs of the desire of the vatican to give a patriarch--patriarchy to the catholic church or just before the war on february 18 or 19 at the request of the congregation for the eastern churches i presented the following report about patriarchy, this report, the text had 35 pages, there is a grounded historical analysis starting from the e-e from the outflows of the patriarchal structure of spiritual management from the old testament, the new testament, the patristics of the middle ages e-e, the byzantine period and then the modern centuries e-e in

the whole church, the universal church, and then the story surrounding the issue of the patriarchate in ukraine. i can not say now what the result will be. i belong to them . there are very few left who as young people took a rather radical step, we left our countries and dioceses to live with patriarch yosif the blind at ukrainian catholic university in rome in the 1970s and 1980s. what kind of life was he, that is, this question is very important to us and we raise it, we see what you know, i have seen too many great events, too many miracles in my life not to to believe that dreams and dreams will come true and that

which is not just what belongs, but what is necessary for our development, for our soul-pastillation of our side, it is very important that we act like the patriarchy, you understand, the patriarchy cannot be such a sticker or a title it should be a title that reflects a powerful and authentic action, now it is most important that we as a church serve people, that we be close, that we be a field hospital, that we , er, be the ones who help heal wounds, and that will be our patriarchate in our unity in our be humble in service and the lord will call us by the

appropriate name, lord, i have another question for you, which is discussed a lot in ukrainian society, not knowing whether this narrative actually reaches you. i listen to many ukrainian intellectuals who say that it is so difficult for ukrainians because the west is used to avoiding evil instead of fighting evil. and we have actually come out. now we have come to the front line, we have become breakwaters in the fight against absolutely unambiguous and absolute evil. do you see this in the west? the world that western man takes good life, peace and everything else for granted and is no longer ready

to fight, give life, shed blood for evil and we have to do it, you know, it is dangerous to characterize a certain time or a certain culture with a few strokes now it is bad once everything was good you know , this is a trend among older people of my age as well, but we see that there are problems with american democracy and responsibility today. america has very deep problems with its political system, and they are related to such questions as you, er, we express we live in a time of great individualism when the decision-making criterion is almost the first i want if i want well then why not we we per otherwise to him different things we

deconstructed a concert of truth truth truth there is no there is your perspective there is my perspective we can find even natural biological things per to do otherwise, denying science and uh, it should be beneficial for me uh, i don't make big commitments today, i don't get married, i don't give birth to children . you know, the extreme trend of what once was and is not prevailing today, and you know, but i am asking americans in other countries, uh, listeners, why do you

look at ukraine like that, never in the history of mankind has any event been so highlighted in the global global consciousness as the war against ukraine has never been. obviously, this is related to modern technology, but today there are 20 wars in the world, we do not pay attention to you, although it is slow , to the war in yemen or to the war of drug dealers in mexico, where many more people died than in people still pay attention to ukraine. i think they pay attention to this war because ukrainians call things by their names, they say this is good and this is absolutely evil. this is right, this is wrong, and they know that this is not just a theoretical philosophical statement. i am ready to give my life for this. to give and here you know not

words but er blood sacrifice that is always places in small towns you can see a blue-yellow flag eh why is the catholic church in america today catholics have already donated more than 100 million dollars for the humanitarian needs of ukrainians these are ordinary people it is not the government after all why under the influence of 100 times their support for ukraine. you know that the americans provided from 200 to 600 million a year to ukraine in various forms of aid. well,

let's say half a billion a year for this half year, 50 billion have already been allocated, that is, 100 times politicians couldn't do this anymore if you didn't know the all-american support and even the requirements for this support of ukraine now ukraine - this is the only issue democrats and republicans vote together almost they are unanimous in supporting ukraine, well, it's a miracle, but it's a consequence of this the position of the moral position of this special sacrifice of those people who are at the front and of the entire ukrainian people who support this war and struggle, and i bow before you all here in ukraine, in particular before our armed forces

head how do you today answer the question of whether it is possible to forgive our enemy without his repentance , you do not see, i think that his beatitude sviatoslav spoke very well about this when in various contexts the question of forgiveness reconciliation is introduced eh hmm it was presented eh presented to ukrainians or the members of our of the wider global community. let 's do it like this . revenge and the desire for the truth and with courage and wisdom we

must protect innocent people, our cities, our families, human dignity and, ultimately, the right of the people to celebrate their identity . in its development, reconciliation can not take place without repentance and