All Ukrainian Council of Churches opposes the comparison of religious organizations to business enterprises

The heads of Churches and religious organizations are troubled by the attempts to deprive religious organizations of their exclusive status of a juridical (legal) person and to place them   on par with commercial enterprises during the procedures of state registration. The All Ukrainian Council of Churches and Religious Organizations (AUCCRO) stated this at its meeting, chaired by UGCC Primate His Beatitude Sviatoslav (Shewchuk),  held on 30 May 2012 in Kyiv, according to the Institute for Religious Freedom. The discussion centered on the issue of legal capacities of those religious organizations that gained status of juridical persons through the registration of their charters (bylaws),  but did not undergo the process of state registration, required by Ukraine’s law:  “On state registration of legal persons and physical persons – entrepreneurs.” Ukraine’s Department of Registration Service Director, Oleksandr Barbeliuk, informed that the process of including information on religious organizations, which were registered by July 1, 2004 into the United State Registry, expired on March 3, 2012.  The official simultaneously assured all that the state registration of such religious organizations will be renewed in several months after the Department conducts its audit of the organizations. According to Oleksandr Barbeliuk, not being entered into this registry makes it impossible for religious organizations to open bank accounts or to perform any official operations such as managing real estate or land properties. Head of the Institute for Religious Freedom, Oleksandr Zayets, also noted that in addition to the registration of the charter (statutes) and the state registration initiated in 2004, religious organizations also have to additionally complete the third phase, namely being included in the Register of Non-Profit Organizations. According to the expert, the latter procedure should be automatized by the tax officials because the law does not permit church organizations to undertake any business activities and places them in a non-profit status. The representatives of confessions opposed introducing complications into the registration procedure since it would thereby ignore their exclusive granted rights of the status of a juridical person.         . Yuriy Bohutsky, the First Vice-Minister of Culture, proposed at the meeting that the issues under discussion should be reviewed in detail at the sessions of the focus group of the Ministry in the presence of representatives of the confessions and professionals from the Ministry of Justice, the State Registration Service and other interested government organs. In commenting on the AUCCRO declaration regarding the functionality of language and the threats of separatism, UOC-KP Patriarch Filaret emphasized the importance of the Council’s activities in terms of consolidating and uniting society.  He stated that various manipulations and media interpretations of this declaration only underline the enormous social weight of AUCCRO. In addition to this, AUCCRO also approved a letter to the Government of Hungary to support the positions directed at safeguarding on the legal level, the religious and moral values inherent in the traditions of these people. Meeting participants also discussed the initiative on Ukraine’s participation in the working group on international cooperation in the areas of education, memory and research of the Holocaust which was further elaborated by the Chief Rabbi of Kyiv and Ukraine Yakov Dov Bleich. The Heads and representatives of individual confessions also empowered the Council Secretariat to develop a proposal for the Ukrainian government on improving relations between Ukrainians abroad and their homeland. At the end of the meeting AUCCRO also approved a Declaration on Road Safety in Ukraine.   List of meeting participants: His Beatitute Sviatoslav (Shewchuk) - Priest and Head, Ukrainian Greek- Catholic Church; Patriarch Filaret (Denysenko) – Primate, Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Kyivan Patriarchate; Archbishop Mytrofon (Yurchuk) – Community Relations Director, Ukrainian Orthodox Church (in union with the Moscow Patriarchate); Viacheslav Nesteruk  -  President, All Ukrainian Union of Evangelical Christians-Baptists; Mykhailo Panochko – Senior Bishop, Church of Christians of Evangelical Faith in Ukraine; Metropolitan Mefodiy (Kudriakov) – Primate, Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church; Bishop Markian Trofymiak – Community Relations Director, Roman-Catholic Church in Ukraine; Vasyl Raichynets – Senior Presbyter, Union of Free Churches of Christians of Evangelical Faith of Ukraine; Viktor Alekseenko – President, UkrainianUniate Conference of the Church of the Adventists of the Seventh Day; Leonid Padun – Senior Bishop, Ukrainian Christian Evangelic Church; Yakov Dov Bleich – President, United Jewish Religious Organizations of Ukraine, Chief Rabbi of Kyiv and Ukraine; Archbishop Hryhoris Buniatian - Head, Ukrainian Eparchy of the Armenian Apostolic Orthodox Church; Sheikh Akhmed Tamim - Head, Spiritual Directorate of Muslims of Ukraine, Muftiya of Ukraine; Ihor Rudzik – Secretary, Ukrainian Lutheran Church; Hryhoriy Komendant – President, Ukrainian Biblical Society.    

Institute for Religious Freedom
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