In recent months, it is well known to all that Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and his government’s judicial bodies have been rapidly stepping up offensive actions against the high-ranking clergy of the Armenian Apostolic Church, and in particular the Catholicos of All Armenians.
This unprecedented behavior began initially as a result of the “indignation” personally felt by Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, who asserts that he is a faithful follower of the Armenian Apostolic Church, as a result of the alleged moral failures in the personal lives of some of the clergy of our church. However, the measures being implemented very quickly began to take the form of clearly state-backed crude initiatives to directly and physically intervene in the life of the Armenian Apostolic Church and the clergy who serve it.
When the prime minister now goes to attend a liturgy every Sunday in a different church, surrounded by a police squad, and the media beforehand announces, in violation of the basic rules of our church liturgy, that the liturgist will omit the mentioning of the name of the Catholicos of All Armenians on that day, when the unprecedented arrests of high-ranking clergymen, often with highly suspect facts, continue, for acts they supposedly committed several years ago, it has become obvious that this reprehensible behavior no longer has anything to do with disquietude felt by the prime minister personally as a regular Armenian church “believer.”
What is being done is a clear violation of the requirements of the Constitution of the Republic of Armenia, and a crude and unauthorized interference by the authorities in the life of the church.
Informed Armenians naturally follow with deep indignation this sad crisis taking place in Armenia, which has gradually become destructive for the entire Armenian nation.
Our press recently made two appeals, first demanding that the Armenian authorities stop the practice of detaining clergy and laity without the basic formalities of a regular trial, thus violating the standards of international justice. This is a practice characteristic of despotic countries. We also demanded that they respect the laws of state non-interference in church affairs embodied in the Constitution of the Republic of Armenia. Secondly, and with equal emphasis we asked the Mother See to implement the requirements of our Church’s canons, by convening episcopal and then national ecclesiastical assemblies as soon as possible in order to examine and when necessary, adopt reforms in the church laws that regulate the operations of the church.
