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Dear President Yanykovych,
With deep sadness, I received the news about the recent events in our beloved Ukraine.
Both experience of the past and the actual society development make it transparently clear that stable, lasting democracy is impossible without religious freedom in full. Thus a modern state won't have the prospects of positive development if it does not guarantee the set of institutions and habits that guarantee equality under the law for all religious actors and a sustainable balance between Church and state.
This means that achieving the secular benefits of democracy - security, economic opportunity, peace with the neighbors - is highly unlikely without religious freedom.
Dear Mr. President!
With wounded heart and the highest respect to you, I beg you: please, stop discrimination in all its forms and manifestations concerning our Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church Canonical and its Primate Moses. In a truly democratic society, nobody can be unfavorably treated because of his or her religious beliefs!
For the statesmen who decide the fates of people in society uniting the representatives of different Churches is of extreme importance to understand the words from the Holy Scripture: "because one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all" (Ephesians 4, 6).
Sticking together, understanding one another, getting along: that is what we need to do in our families and in our societies. Each person is of equal value having been made in the image of God!
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