Thirteen NGO of Armenia urged not to publish the letter of Patriarch of Jerusalem, Archbishop Manoogian Nurhan to His Holiness Catholicos Karekin II in full. NGOs are concerned about publicity of the letter, and believe that it weakens the grounds Armenian Apostolic church.
Aravot.am asked Stepan Danielyan, Chairman of “Cooperation for Democracy” Center, to comment on the letter, whether the scandalous letter shows a recovery process is going on inside the church. “In my opinion, several clans are formed inside the church, and, in fact, two main clans, who fight against each other, but this struggle, in my opinion, does not have particular ideological, theological or doctrinal basis, there are no ideas in this struggle, which lead to reforms, it seems to me that this is just an inner clan struggle, nothing more. Because there are honest priests, and people with very suspicious behavior in both sides. In this case, the struggle goes on between individuals rather than an idea or reform. In that respect, I do not see a recovery trend in it. But what is going on in the church, must become a public nature, and people and the society must try to get a discourse through these public discussions.”
And whether the rebellion of youth NGOs are spontaneous, to this regard, Mr. Danielyan said,- “Surely, we can not say whether it is spontaneous or guided, but there is one clear tendency: there are some social movements, mass media, which are directly guided by this or that wing of the church, and their goal is to discredit each other, on the one hand, and to deviate public from ecclesiastical affairs by struggling against ‘sectarians’, on the other hand, or by other alike anti-constitutional ideas, for which criminal articles are also provided. We all know that in many cases a lot of issues are guided by the church, and having such potential and opportunities, it is likely that they will use it for self-defense.”
Gohar HAKOBYAN
