The clergy and monastics of the Raška-Prizren Diocese with a total of 190 signatures addressed an appeal to the Serbian state leadership and international representatives, requesting them to ensure the survival and peaceful life of the Serbian people and churches in Kosovo.
The appeal accentuates that the partition, the exchange of territory or „partition between Serbs and Albanians“ would leave most of the people to the mercy of those who, as they point out, up through now, have not shown willingness to respect the rights of the Serbian people. The appeal also emphasises the risk of an exodus if the partition scenario should take place.
Also, the appeal points out the necessity of preserving Kosovo as a part of Serbia by international standards and UN Resolution 1244, with the further explanation that it “does not mean confrontation with the world“, but a „confirmation of the view that without basic human rights and freedoms of a given nation, there is no stable solution in the long run“.
The question of Kosovo with its 1500 Serbian Orthodox Christian monasteries, churches, endowments and monuments of culture is not a matter of national ideology or mythology, and especially it is not just about territory, it was also pointed out.
Kosovo is seen as the core of the Church and collective being of the Serbian nation and its existence, with an emphasis on the Serbian Orthodox Church’s Synod’s previous appeal in May.
Finally, the Raška-Prizren Diocese has requested from the Serbian state leadership and international representatives ensure the survival and peaceful life of the Serbian people and churches in Kosovo.
„This appeal is not an interference in politics, but above all a loud cry of those who, living in Kosovo and Metohija, and in front of God and their own conscience, have a responsibility towards the faithful people, with whom we comprise the living Church,“ the church representatives responded following an accusation from state leaders on the Church meddling in state affairs.
To read the full text of an appeal signed by 190 Kosovo Serb parish priests, abbots, abbesses, monks and nuns, click HERE.
Orthodox Christians celebrate today one of the great feasts of the Church – The Transfiguration of the Lord.
Bishop Teodosije and the Abbot of Visoki Dečani Monastery, Sava Janjić, have recently come under strong criticism and verbal attacks by both official Belgrade politicians and the Srpska Lista after the Bishop’s appeal against an ethnic partition and Janjić’s warning of the threat of a staged incident in the North to provoke a partition. Both of them warned of threats to force the majority of Kosovo Serbs, some 70.000 of them south of the partition line into an imminent exodus.
Preuzimanje i objavljivanje tekstova sa portala KoSSev nije dozvoljeno bez navođenja izvora. Hvala na poštovanju etike novinarske profesije.
