The Orthodox Church distances itself once more from the extremist party AUR: We firmly dissociate ourselves from any irresponsible praise for the exponents of dictatorial political regimes

The Romanian Orthodox Church(BOR) has harshly criticized in a press release the behavior of the extremist party AUR, which it says represents „the political-ideological confiscation of faith and its distortion through instrumentalization.”

It is the second critical stance of the Church against AUR in the space of a week and it comes after the AUR leader George Simion dismissed the Church’s first statement, saying it is not an official statement of the church and that it does not refer to his party.

„The genuinely grasped Christianity, expressed in a way of life founded on a way of thinking enlightened by the words of Christ and nourished by knowledge, not parasitized by ignorance, by intellectual and spiritual laziness, or darkened by the shadows of political ideologies and the pathologies of faith of the type of magical beliefs  (bigotry, religious formalism, sterile ritualism), this healthy Christianity, which celebrates otherness through respect for the other, is never expressed brashly, aggressively and gracelessly from the height of a public high ground,” reads a press release from the Press Office of the head of the Romanian Orthodox Church.

„The hideous alternatives to this public manifestation of the true faith express only surrogates of politically and ideologically confiscated Christianity, which the Church firmly rejects,” the statement added.

„The Church equally firmly disavows any irresponsible praise for the exponents of past or present dictatorial political regimes, regardless of the fact that they have mimicked or are publicly mimicking Christianity while at the same time committing serious acts of oppression or violation of the principles of a democratic society reverent of the Christian values upon which it was built,” the Church also transmits.

Article edited for English by Ovidiu Harfaș. Original article in Romanian.