Videomessaggio del Capo e Padre della Chiesa greco-cattolica ucraina nella 216 ª settimana di guerra su vasta scala, 05 aprile 2026
Glory to Jesus Christ!
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ!
This Sunday marks the 216th week of the devastating war in Ukraine. Once again, this week has been filled with grief, tears, fire, blood, and suffering on Ukrainian soil.
This week, we express our condolences to our brave city of Kharkiv, where people suffer daily from Russian attacks using various weapons. Kharkiv lies just 20 kilometers from the Russian-Ukrainian border, and this city of nearly one million people has become a stronghold in our fight for freedom and independence. Over the past week, it has endured countless attacks—drones have struck high-rise buildings, and ballistic missiles have even hit a residential apartment block. People have been killed, and many injured, including a newborn baby.
This week, the enemy also deliberately targeted Odesa and its port. This maritime gateway of Ukraine, which enables us to feed many people around the world with Ukrainian grain, has once again come under attack from Russian drones and missiles.
We are especially grateful to God and to our Ukrainian soldiers that Ukraine has stood firm this week as well.
During the spring season in Ukraine, when farmers are working to secure the harvest and agricultural work is underway in the fields, we wish to draw the attention of our faithful and all people of goodwill to a very important issue: protecting the environment, even in the midst of war.
Today, Ukraine is facing true ecocide; there is no form of pollution that Russian forces have not inflicted on our land. Every time a Russian missile carrying toxic fuel or a drone strikes Ukrainian soil or waters, the environment suffers.
Ukraine is now one of the most heavily mined countries in the world. Nearly 140,000 square kilometers of land are contaminated with explosives—an area almost half the size of Italy. Clearing it will take decades.
This ecocide unfolding in Ukraine is the greatest environmental crime in Europe in modern history.
Forests have also been severely affected. During the war, nearly a thousand square kilometers of Ukrainian forests have been burned or destroyed. That is why this week we held a special campaign, particularly in Kyiv and the Kyiv region. We planted new saplings to lay the foundation for a renewed environmental awareness and a deeper sense of responsibility for creation, and we integrated this initiative into the ongoing campaign “Plant a Tree of Peace,” which our Bureau for Environmental Affairs has been carrying out for many years.
Today, we emphasize that everything living in Ukraine is suffering—people as well as the natural environment. That is why we must stand together with one voice to defend life in Ukraine in all its forms, and above all to defend human dignity.
We want the world to hear us. Today we see that Ukraine—our pain, and the crimes committed against both people and the environment—is fading from the headlines of the world’s media. The tragedy of war in the Middle East is diverting attention from the tragedy in Ukraine, and many believe that the situation here has calmed down and stabilized. This is a dangerous illusion. Ukraine is enduring hardship and trial every single day.
But Ukraine stands. Ukraine fights. Ukraine prays.
This Sunday, most Ukrainians who follow the Eastern Paschal cycle celebrate one of the Lord’s greatest feasts—the solemn entry of our Lord Jesus Christ into Jerusalem. This feast opens the way to Holy Week and the Lord’s Resurrection. Traditionally, we hasten to our churches with green branches, with our Ukrainian willow, to welcome Christ as He enters our cities and villages, our homes, and our hearts.
On this day, we pray especially for our youth. This is a special Youth Day in our Church, for young people are the green branches, the living shoots of the enduring tree of the Ukrainian people. It is upon their shoulders that the heaviest burden of the war has fallen. It is a great tragedy that each day we must lay the flower of the Ukrainian nation to rest.
Yet our youth deserve our gratitude and our support. They are both the present and the future of Ukraine, and they remain faithful Christians.
I would like to greet our young women and men on this special day and assure them that their Church is with them—ready to serve them, to be close to them, and to create a place for young people in every parish and community. On this feast day, as young people say to our Savior who comes, “Hosanna to the Son of David! Glory to God in the highest!”, it is they who give voice to the people welcoming the Savior.
At the same time, many Christians around the world today celebrate the Lord’s Resurrection. I extend my greetings to all the faithful of our Church in various parts of the world who celebrate on this day the greatest Christian feast—the Resurrection of Christ. I wish you the strength of true faith in the Resurrection, for to be a Christian means to believe in it. May the Risen Christ be the source of our hope. He shows us that even death is not the end, but a beginning—renewed each day in every good work we do together for humanity in the modern world.
Today we pray: Lord, bless Ukraine. Stop the war. Bless the children of Ukraine, the Ukrainian youth. Bless, protect, and preserve our young men and women on the front lines. Grant that we may all live to see the day when we can say that the war has ended, that peace has come to our home together with our Lord and Savior, to whom we sing “Hosanna!” today.
Bless, O Lord, our Motherland with Your just and heavenly peace.
The blessing of the Lord be upon you, through His grace and love for mankind, always, now and forever, and for the ages of ages. Amen.
Glory to Jesus Christ!
