‘War against Orthodoxy underway’

Efforts to intimidate Christian worshipers will fail, Emir Kusturica has said in response to Moldova’s treatment of a bishop.

The move by authorities in Chisinau to prevent a Moldovan bishop from attending an annual ceremony in Jerusalem is part of a wider war against Orthodox Christianity, renowned Serbian filmmaker Emir Kusturica has said.

Bishop Marchel of the Moldovan Orthodox Church was set to fly to Israel on Thursday for the Holy Fire ritual on April 19. He told the media that border police at Chisinau airport had stopped him for a search and returned his passport only after his plane had departed, despite finding nothing suspicious. Marchel later said his second attempt to board a flight to Israel was also “unjustifiably” blocked by the authorities.

The Holy Fire ritual at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, held on Holy Saturday, is a key event which precedes Orthodox Easter. The flame is believed to descend miraculously each year at the site of Christ’s crucifixion. Pilgrims light candles from it and take the fire back to their home countries to light others as part of an ancient holiday tradition.

When asked by RIA Novosti on Friday about the Moldovan government’s treatment of the bishop, Kusturica said, “after the attack on the Kiev Pechersk Lavra, nothing surprises me anymore.”

In late March, Ukrainian officials and police broke into the catacombs of the country’s most important monastery, the burial site of early Orthodox saints. The move came amid a power struggle over the Kiev Pechersk Lavra between the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) and the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU), created only in 2018 and backed by the government of Vladimir Zelensky.

“It was a sign of war against the Orthodox world, against Orthodox Russians and all Orthodox believers,” the two-time Palme d’Or winner said about the events in Kiev.

The blocking of the Moldovan bishop’s trip to Jerusalem “continues that same battle. They think that with new secular political steps they will first intimidate and then destroy Orthodox civilization. But they will not succeed,” Kusturica insisted.

As in neighboring Ukraine, Moldova has faced religious tensions involving two major Orthodox factions: the Moldovan Orthodox Church, which is affiliated with the Moscow Patriarchate, and the Metropolis of Bessarabia, under the Romanian Orthodox Church. Amid rising geopolitical tensions with Russia, the pro-EU government in Chisinau has largely backed the Bucharest-aligned metropolis.

Image credit: Mariana Mishina