Ukrainian Bishop: Why are the Russians Putting up Statues of Stalin in Occupied Ukraine?
An Interview by Crusade Magazine with Bishop Stepan Sus, Curial Bishop of Kyiv-Halyč, Ukraine, Titular Bishop of Zygris
Crusade: Thank you for coming to visit us. What scenario do you foresee for the Catholic Church in Ukraine if Russia takes over?
Bishop Sus: First of all, we understand that Russia will not respect our Church. We see that from what is happening in the occupied territories. The Ukrainian Catholic Church was expelled from the territories. The priests were persecuted or imprisoned, so it means that for Russia, respect for other churches, respect for human dignity and life in a democracy do not exist. We don’t relate to Russian points of view, and so we hope that Ukraine will stay, and we will defend ourselves as much as we can. For the last few years, Russian forces moved very slowly in the Donbas area, and we lost approximately 15% of our territory. But we hope that that will be the end of this war.
Crusade: How has prayer, especially the Holy Rosary, helped Catholics in Ukraine cope with the tragedy of war?
Bishop Sus: Ukrainians are praying every day for peace. That’s our main intention because we understand that prayer is the weapon of Christians. We need to defend ourselves, our families and our homes, but at the same time, the most successful weapon of the faithful is prayer. We pray a national rosary on our Ukrainian Catholic television every evening at eight. It is live, with approximately 550,000 people gathering to pray. Everyone understands that it is necessary to pray and ask God for peace and pray for our soldiers, wounded soldiers and civilian people, and also pray for our migrants, people who had to leave their homes.
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Crusade: Our Lady of Fatima warned the world of the errors of Russia. In light of the Fatima message, what are the errors of Russia?
Bishop Sus: For us, this message of the Virgin Mary of Fatima is, of course, some sign to understand the conditions of this war. If the Virgin Mary talked about the conversion of somebody or nations, it means that this group of people can bring something dangerous, something not acceptable for us, and could be a source of evil. Our soldiers who were captured experienced torture and other terrible things. One soldier mentioned that he saw the real face of evil. I understand that today, evil has a human mask so that we can have different imaginations of evil, and sometimes the source of evil can be human beings. So that might be the vision that Mary foresaw with this war, which is caused by Russia. Russians say that they want to reestablish the Soviet Union, but from a new point of view, like the Russian world, which is dangerous because everybody knows how it was.
Crusade: How is the morale of the Ukrainian troops compared to the Russian forces? Is there a noticeable difference in morale?
Bishop Sus: You have to imagine that the Russian soldier will kill everybody whom they capture. They don’t respect human beings. They don’t respect international law. We can see in several videos on the internet where they are killing people. In the last video, they asked a Ukrainian soldier to say his last words before he was killed, and this soldier started to pray the Our Father, and the Russian soldiers killed him. Those Russian soldiers were Orthodox Christians, but they didn’t respect the prayer of this soldier. I asked one officer if he prays on the front line. He said yes. I asked him what he was asking Jesus in his prayer, and he answered: “First of all, I ask Jesus to help me to make the right decision. And second, to keep my human mask, my human face.”
Crusade: Since the Russian invasion, has there been more or less interest in the Catholic Church in Ukraine?
Bishop Sus: Of course, when there are conditions of war with big challenges, dramatic trauma, injured hearts, severely wounded people, destroyed villages, churches and cities, people are asking where God is when we suffer today. Thanks be to God, they are searching for the right answers in the Church. Also, the Catholic Church in Ukraine plants itself for non-believers as a place for shelter and humanitarian help. The Church established resilient points where people could come to rest or get what they needed. So, people started to see another face of the Church, even many who were atheists and who never went to church before.
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Crusade: How are Catholics treated in areas of Ukraine occupied by Putin’s army? You had already mentioned that the churches are closed.
Bishop Sus: Churches are closed down, and people are persecuted, as well as the priest, because for the Russians, a Catholic Church is a church of democracy, a church trying to be with ordinary people, support people, be with those who have suffered. The authorities do not allow the churches to have services. Two priests who were in the East Donbas area were arrested two years ago because they gathered people for prayer. It was not allowed by the occupation government, and they were arrested. And thanks to the Vatican and other diplomats, they were released after two years. When speaking about the Church in the occupied territories, it means only the Russian Orthodox Church. Other churches are not respected.
Crusade: Have you heard of any miracles? Or divine interventions on the battlefield? And if so, do you have any short stories that you could share with our readers?
Bishop Sus: Yes, I remember the soldiers telling me about the rosaries we distributed. Some of them had never prayed the rosary before. They just kept them or wore them around their necks. When they were being shelled, they started to pray by themselves. Using the rosary, they were saved. We can find a lot of stories of how the icons or prayer books, which soldiers kept in their pockets, saved them from the bullets.
Crusade: Some people claim that Russia has converted and that after the fall of the Iron Curtain, communism is finally dead. Do you share that opinion?
Bishop Sus: I think that we didn’t condemn the communist regime. We condemned fascism, but we never condemned the communist regime. We never spoke about all the crimes that were committed by Lenin, Stalin and other communist rulers.
When we look back in history, they persecuted the Church. They pushed God out of the institutions and from the lives of people. They replaced all Christian values with communist values. They sent a lot of people to Siberian camps or killed those people who had their own thoughts and opinions about the regime.
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Today, the Russians are still keeping their monuments to these communist tyrants in Russia and putting up some monuments to Stalin in the occupied territories of Ukraine. For example, we kept the old statues of Stalin in our “museums of tyranny,” which were created just after Ukraine’s independence from Russia. In the occupied eastern part of Ukraine, they’re taking these monuments from the museums and putting them in the main squares of the cities.
I think that today when we speak about the war, we can see that many times, the Russian authorities tell us that we have to propagate Lenin and Stalin. Russia is using communist ideology covered by their quasi-democracy politics. Russian authorities say that this war is against those who do not respect the Christian faith and values. It is dangerous when the communist regime changes itself by taking some democratic points of view and trying to use Christian values to justify its own crimes. We have to condemn the communist regime as we condemned the fascist regime. The crimes committed by both are awful. Lots of people died, churches were closed, and God was expelled from public life.
Crusade: What would be your message to America now, especially after the election?
Bishop Sus: First of all, I would like to ask all Americans not to forget the Ukrainian people. We are suffering a lot. It’s important that we know that Americans are with us and that you understand what is happening in Ukraine. In this third year of the war, Ukrainians are so tired, but we have to be strong. We try to pray and do our best to save our country, and I would like to express my gratitude to many Americans who came to visit Ukraine during this time of war. I also thank the volunteers and many people who try to send humanitarian aid to Ukrainian women, children and orphans in need. When we have friends in such difficult conditions, it gives us hope and stability. I kindly ask all Americans to be our advocates. Be next to all Ukrainians, this long-suffering nation. Help us.
Crusade: Yes, please be assured that we are with you. Thank you very much.
Bishop Sus: Yes, thank you.
© & Photo Credit: Галашова Ольга Алексеевна, CC BY-SA 4.0
Updated March 5, 2025.
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