A Sect, a Capital, and a Question: Has Ukraine Grown Up Enough?

Source: Author’s Facebook page

A vivid exposé of a Russian church school. A rigorous journalistic investigation. A wave of public outrage — justified and necessary.

Look. Yes, during the war, 60 children — meaning 60 pairs of parents — were studying in a Soviet-style school operating under the cover of the Moscow Church. That is a fact.

But we are talking about Kyiv, a city of four million people. In reality, this comes down to about 120 parents — no more. I assume there were no same-sex parent couples there, by the way, which some people consider far more “dangerous” to children. Add a few eccentric grandparents, and let’s say we are talking about 150 people in total.

In other words, this is a tiny sect by Kyiv’s standards. In a city of four million, Kyiv has seen far larger sects than this. What we are witnessing here is that Russian structures managed to gather around 150 marginal individuals under one roof — and that was their ceiling.

This is, although roughly 20 percent of Kyiv’s population today consists of people who relocated from eastern regions because of the war and who, objectively, are more inclined toward Soviet patterns of thinking. These are precisely the groups that sects affiliated with the Moscow Patriarchate traditionally target.

Yes, there is also an unpleasant story involving schools that helped cover this up. But no sect operates without someone covering for it. That part of the story is less about ideology and more about corruption. There is no doubt that Russian structures do not spare money for such operations.

So on one side, we are dealing with a pro-Russian sect operating during wartime. On the other hand, we see that today the Moscow Patriarchate — with all its financial resources and influence — is capable of organizing only a small group of about 150 people, which is already perceived in Ukraine as something almost absurd.

Would such a reaction have been possible five years ago? Ten years ago? Twenty years ago?

That is the real question.

Marginals exist in every society. In any society. Italy—and Italians—will not let you lie. And of course, our people also have their own: a small people’s group was waiting for Putin, and may even pray to his portrait.

The real question is not whether they exist, but how many of them there are—and what influence they actually have.

And this is the extent of that influence: about 150 people. If you gathered them in a square, it would not look insignificant. In percentage terms, the figure is negligible. And the fact that they are now perceived primarily as a manifestation of collective madness is real progress for us. Significant progress.

There is a well-known principle: a system is defined not by the presence of an error, but by its reaction to that error. The same applies to society. The presence of a sect does not define a society; how it perceives and responds to it does.

By that measure, we have passed this test very well.

We remind you that in Kyiv, an underground school operates at the monastery of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate, “Holosiivska Pustyn”. According to journalists from ” Slidstvo.Info “, children are taught there using Soviet textbooks, films are shown, and Russian songs are taught.

At the same time, the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate does not know which school at the monastery is mentioned in the investigation by journalists “Investigation. Info”. As stated by the head of the Synodal Information and Educational Department of the UOC MP, Metropolitan Kliment, the school was not created in accordance with the decision of the Holy Synod of the UOC, and the educational institution itself is not officially registered.

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