Ukrainian official calls for Russian church to be expelled from World Council of Churches
A senior Ukrainian government official has called for the Russian Orthodox Church to be expelled from the World Council of Churches, saying its conduct during the war in Ukraine violated the foundational principles of Christianity.
Viktor Yelensky, head of Ukraine’s State Service for Freedom of Conscience, made the demand at a seminar organized by the Collège des Bernardins, a Catholic research center in Paris, according to the Church Times.
He said the WCC, a Geneva-based ecumenical body whose 356 member denominations represent some 580 million Christians worldwide, should “exclude the Russian Church from membership since its activities directly contradict the fundamental principles of Christianity.”
Yelensky said the Moscow Patriarchate was “an enemy of both religious freedom and Ukraine” that sought to suppress religious expression and destroy Ukrainian statehood, culture and identity.
He contends it's “absolutely legitimate” to discuss sanctions against Moscow Patriarch Kirill, whom he accused of serving as a spokesman for Russian war aims, and against other clergy who had glorified the war or were conducting what Kirill himself has called “subversive work” in Western countries.
The remarks came after Russian missile and drone strikes about a week ago killed at least 22 civilians and wounded dozens more in Kyiv, Kharkiv, Dnipro, Zaporizhzhia and other Ukrainian cities.
Ukraine’s Council of Churches and Religious Organizations condemned the strikes in a statement, saying they destroyed and damaged residential buildings, churches, schools, hospitals and commercial offices, and had occurred just days after “the bright holiday of the Trinity,” the feast marking the fiftieth day after Easter.
“These bloody crimes are being committed by Russian invaders of Ukrainian soil with the active support of the Moscow Patriarchate, an integral part of the criminal Kremlin regime,” the council said, according to the Church Times.
Calls for the Russian Orthodox Church’s removal from the WCC date to February 2022, when Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Anglican, Orthodox, Roman Catholic and Protestant leaders from 15 countries signed a petition demanding expulsion, including former Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams.
The WCC’s central committee rejected that demand at a meeting in June 2022, saying it “acknowledged and welcomed” the Moscow Patriarchate’s commitment “to engage in encounter and dialogue under WCC auspices.”
The issue resurfaced in April 2024, when WCC General Secretary the Rev. Prof. Jerry Pillay said the organization was “seeking clarifications” after Patriarch Kirill endorsed a statement calling for a total takeover of Ukraine and declaring the conflict a “holy war” against the West, which Kirill said had “fallen into Satanism.”
Neither the WCC nor its communications office has said whether Patriarch Kirill replied to Pillay’s request.
In a statement, Pillay said he deplored the latest “deadly cycle of violence” and called for a lasting peace built on “respect for international law and fundamental moral precepts.” He noted that last weekend’s strikes followed attacks on Kyiv in May that killed 24 people, as well as Russian reports that a Ukrainian drone strike had killed 21 students at a college dormitory near Russian-controlled Luhansk.
