ZENIT: Your Beatitude, you had expressed some reservations about the passage relating to Ukraine in the declaration the Pope had signed with Patriarch Kirill of the Patriarchate of Moscow in Cuba two years ago. Do you feel as you did in the past? Do you still have these reservations?Mostly, yes, because none of these wishes have been applied yet in Ukraine. We have not reached the peace. We did not reach the possibility to establish proper respecting of one another. We encounter unfortunately the situations when the Orthodox priests of one church do not want to celebrate the funeral of a baby of two years old of another church, or of a soldier killed in war, and so on. This unfortunately exists in Ukraine. These written declarations signed in Havana still do not function. Therefore, it is necessary to really commit ourselves. Also, I must say, that this declaration afterwards did have a positive effect. Most of all, we are happy that they met, the leaders of the Churches. In my opinion, there needs to be second, third and fourth encounters [smiling] because subsequent ones could reflect that the scope or goal of the first encounter was not reached. If people do not meet, conflicts cannot be terminated. No? We cannot play back our memories to have results, but only through meeting can we reconcile and go forward together.
Therefore, I wish there will be another encounter. Then, also, this declaration, and also our reservations, gave us the possibility to enter into the dialogue as the Greek-Catholic Church of Ukraine, a Church
sui iuris (‘self-governing’). We were not involved in the preparation of this text, but now we are part of the dialogue. So everyone is interested in this question, even you, if you are asking this question of what we think.
This declaration created publicity for us! We also can express our point of view, but I must reiterate the Greek Catholic Church of Ukraine sees the ecuмenical mission as the integral part of its identity, even if we must point out and uphold the truth and it is hard or uncomfortable. But this is us: the Lord has given us this, lifting us out from secrecy of the Soviet Union, for a mission. And we think that this mission means being witnesses, participants of a sincere, authentic ecuмenical dialogue.
https://zenit.org/articles/interview-while-expressing-gratitude-for-holy-sees-efforts-to-help-ukraine-major-archbishop-shevchuk-still-displeased-about-declaration-with-russian-patriarch-kirill/