His Beatitude the Archbishop of Ohrid and Metropolitan of Skopje kyr kyr Jovan (John) went to Prison Idrizovo

His Beatitude, the Archbishop of Ohrid and Metropolitan of Skopje, kyr kyr Jovan (John), after confirming several times before the public that he would voluntarily go to serve the sentence to which he was convicted, went on his way to the prison Idrizovo, near Skopje. Previously, the Court of Appeal in Bitola rejected his demand to postpone the serving of the prison sentence. As those who gave the written order resolutely pointed out, the Archbishop kyr kyr John was given time until 26 July 2005, midnight, to appear in the prison Idrizovo. As a loyal citizen of the Republic of Macedonia and a man who respects the laws of the state, with the putting into effect of the resolution, went voluntarily to report in the prison.

However, the Macedonian society once again failed the exam of following the standards of democracy of the Euro-Atlantic civilization. During his traveling from Bitola to Skopje, the Archbishop kyr kyr John was followed and was stopped by the police on several occasions. When he was stopped, the Archbishop kyr kyr John and the vehicle in which he traveled were thoroughly inspected, however, not even once did the police give a written confirmation that it conducted an inspection.

When he was entering Skopje, in the suburb Avtokomanda, the police patrol stopped once again the Archbishop kyr kyr John asking for driving permits. After he gave those to the police, with verbal maltreatment and psychological harassment the same ordered the Archbishop kyr kyr John to transfer into the police vehicle. When the Archbishop asked them if they had a court order and if he could have a copy of the probable warrant, the policemen answered that they would give him a copy at the police station in Avtokomanda, where they invited his traveling companions as well. Yet, the police lied most brutally. Without allowing him to say good bye to his closest, without allowing his closest to take a blessing from their Arch-Pastor, asking him for his prayers, the police cruelly took him to the prison explaining that he was supposed to turn up there before 3 pm.

In the future we recommend the police of Bitola and of Skopje to agree if the period for appearing in the prison is 24 hours or if it is until 3 pm!!!

We remain with the bitterness of the uncivilized gesture which was referred to, even by some of the reporters, as kidnapping of the Archbishop kyr kyr John by the police so that the scenes of his sending away by the numerous priests, monks and members of the Orthodox Ohrid Archbishopric would be avoided.

Still, even when we think that this is the bottom of the being uncivilized of the contemporary Macedonian society, its being uncivilized proves to be a bottomless pit. When his closest arrived to the prison to bring him his necessary personal items and books, the policemen most ruthlessly threw away the book of the New Testament and his cassock (anteri – the priests black mantle) loudly shouting that these were strictly forbidden.

Bitterness befell you Macedonia when you treat like this an Archbishop recognized and confirmed by the entire Orthodox ecumene. You put him behind bars stripping his cassock from him, which is not a uniform but his skin, and you spit on the New Testament for the Christians, on the Koran for the Muslims, the Talmud for the Jews, where these are most needed.

Just as a reminder, we will mention that in the period, which as it proves was unjustly called, Ottoman oppression, he cassocks were never stripped from the imprisoned priests; as a matter of fact there are old documents and photographs to testify this.

His Beatitude the Archbishop of Ohrid and Metropolitan of Skopje kyr kyr John actually testified that he is an icon of Christ of our holy Church. “And as blameless lamb before its shearer is dumb, so He opened not His mouth”. We testify that during all that time he did not utter a single foul word for those who persecute the Church in the Republic of Macedonia. This is exactly why, respecting the laws of the state, he went to serve his prison sentence. Then again, we will say that the verdict is completely unlawful, and we will not make a mistake if we emphasize that it is utter uncouthness. It is truly miserable that in the 21st century a court tries and convicts an Archbishop of a Church for his act according to the Gospel he preaches. It is a great shame for the Republic of Macedonia that the greatest part of its judges in the Courts of Fist Instance and in the Courts of Appeal are just a gang of ignorant and uneducated people who never touched either the Gospel, or other parts of the Holy Scripture. These people still live the communist’s dream of destroying the Church.

Yet, those who need to be ashamed are not. We, the Church of God, the most conscious part of the society are burdened with the shame they should carry. Indeed, after the mindless verdict for the Archbishop kyr kyr John we are ashamed to say that we are the citizens of this country called Republic of Macedonia.

For those who convicted His Beatitude, the Archbishop of Ohrid and Metropolitan of Skopje, kyr kyr John for his Orthodox faith, showing Republic of Macedonia as a country that nurtures a fierce religious discrimination, we can only say what the Gospel teaches us: “Lord forgive them for they know not what they are doing”.

http://www.poa-info.org

13.07.2005

The Chapel of “Saint Nectarios of Aegina” Demolished

The lynch that the regime of the Republic of Macedonia executed over the religious freedom, the private property and the right to life on 12 July 2005 definitely determined it as a country with an indescribable barbarism and primitivism.

On 10 July 2005, about ten drunk individuals, led by Zoran Spasovski, an employee in Public Transportation, just as the priest Borjan Vitanov was arriving at the chapel of “Saint Nectarios of Aegina” they pulled him out of his vehicle and lying him down on the street they brutally beat him up. There is a medical certificate for this. During this, they grabbed his keys and his cell phone, so, he could neither call help nor could he protect himself. Two other believers were with him, and they were also hurt by the drunken group. This group also demolished the car with which the priest Borjan Vitanov arrived at the chapel. Of course, as usual, not only did the police not do anything, but also it openly put itself in defense of the ruffians, trying to distort the event before the public completely.

The denial to register the Orthodox Ohrid Archbishopric by the Government of the Republic of Macedonia, the encouragement of religious discrimination and the discourse of hatred protected by the agencies of persecution of the Republic of Macedonia resulted in beating up of the believing people of the Orthodox Ohrid Archbishopric and the demolition of the chapel of “Saint Nectarios of Aegina” in the suburb Dracevo, Skopje, on 12 July 2005.

On the morning of 12 July 2005, at 7.30 am, a crowd of above fifty people, led by the schismatic priest, the senior priest of the temple of the Macedonian Orthodox Church in Dracevo, Goran, together with the board of the church, armed with axes, spades and other sorts of tools, started to demolish the chapel of “Saint Nectarios of Aegina” when they also physically attacked and beaten up the chanter Nikola, a man known for his humility, who was unable to protect himself. Before the eyes of the chanter Nikola and the member of the Orthodox Ohrid Archbishopric Mr. Trayan, they continued the demolition. Around 8.30 am, the clerics arrived, and some of the members of the Orthodox Ohrid Archbishopric as well. In the meantime a group of about a hundred people with axes and hammers in their hands gathered around, they blocked the street “Vojvoda Ivec” and they brutally attacked the priests, the deacon and the believing people of the Orthodox Ohrid Archbishopric, who in the spirit of the Christian love and understanding gathered there, on a private property, to pray on the great feast of Saint Peter’s Day. According to a well worked through scenario, after the arrival of the police they managed somehow to get away just because among the members of the Orthodox Ohrid Archbishopric was the eminent representative of the Macedonian culture, the actor Mr. Tome Vitanov. After this, the police, as it was according to their tactics, completely aware of the following moment, left the hooligans to demolish the cabin-chapel, private property of the famous actor Slavko Ninov, quite undisturbed.

The Republic of Macedonia is only formally a signatory of the international conventions that guarantee the religious freedoms and human rights. But the lynch organized on religious basis n 12 July 2005 makes it crystal clear that the Republic of Macedonia conducts a state terrorism over all those who refuse to comply with the totalitarian Caesar-Papal matrix.

This sort of barbarianism points to the fact that the Republic of Macedonia has absolutely transparently abolished the right to a freedom of religious confession, which logically proves that the agencies of persecution, in whichever formation, can freely lynch anyone who is not suitable to their religious convictions, demolishing his/her home with the aid of the police.

The lynch that happened in the chapel of “Saint Nectarios of Aegina” remains to hang as a morbid reminder that the Government of the Republic of Macedonia, systematically kills the people’s natural need for tolerance and respect for diversity by mercilessly throwing people, and in general the country, into a sort of autism that protects itself through violence.

The photographs of the lynch testify clearly enough that the Republic of Macedonia, in collaboration with the schismatic organization – the Macedonian Orthodox Church, which has left a signature on their malicious act, definitely and contrary to all the Euro-Atlantic and Christian principles, have publicly executed the freedom of religious confession and the right to a home and to life.

What we are left with, after the prayers of saint Nectarios of Aegina, is to say that we do not wish even to our worst enemies the thing that happened to the Orthodox Ohrid Archbishopric, the only canonical Church in the Republic of Macedonia recognized by all the local Orthodox Churches.

http://www.poa-info.org

12.07.2005

APPEAL

 

 

After the illegal expelling (without a court order) of the Archbishop kyr kyr John (Jovan) from the cathedra in Veles in June 2002, as well as the expelling of the monks from four monasteries in January 2004;

after the lighting fire to the monastery in the village Nizhepole and the cutting of the hair of the nuns in the same in February 2004;

after the legalized identification of the declaratively secular state with a specific religious community – the Macedonian Orthodox Church (MOC), expressed through the Parliament’s “Declaration for support of the autocephaly of the MOC” reached on 23 January 2004;

after the demolition of the Church in the monastery “Saint John Chrysostom” in October 2004 and the confirmation of the 18 months of prison sentence for the Archbishop kyr kyr John in June 2005;

and, after the continuous discourse of hatred, which is an open summons to lynch, conducted by a certain group of reporters, close to the police (Broanko Gjorgjevski, Janko Ilkovski, Biljana Jovanovska, Aco Kabranov, Aleksandar Chomovski), it is more than obvious that the state authorities of the Republic of Macedonia, in collaboration with the sponsored-by-them Macedonian Orthodox Church, conduct a state terror, abolishing the right to freedom of religious confession and private propery.

Contrary to the currents of the civilization, according to which the respect of the freedom of religious confession is one of the basic human rights and freedoms, the Macedonian government, which formally appears as a signatory of the international conventions that guarantee those rights, in the recent days, progressively proves to be a cynical executioner of the values which are the foundations of every civilized and democratic society.

The abolition of the right to a free choice of a religious confession and belief is officially confirmed by the Macedonian judicial authorities in the verdict against the Archbishop kyr kyr John from July 2004, where, in a totalitarian manner, the judge Misko Stojkovski postulates: “the Macedonian Orthodox Church is the only religious organization of the Macedonian people’ (!!!).

Also, as an outcome of the Caesar-Papal unity of the state with the abovementioned “only religious organization of the Macedonian people”, the agencies of persecution of the Republic of Macedonia, on several occasions, brutally violated the right to a private property and inviolability of the homes of the citizens – tax payers and members of the Orthodox Ohrid Archbishopric (the cases in Resen and Prilep, December 2004).

This political ideology, as a foundation of the terror and religious discrimination that is transparently conducted by the Macedonian government, spiced up with the discourse of hatred and the summons to lynch, on 10 July 2005, resulted in a brutal beating of the priest Borjan Vitanov. However, this did not suffice to the Macedonian police, so two days later, on 12 July 2005, they did nothing when the furious mob of some one hundred people, led by the senior priest of the local temple of the MOC, the priest Goran, with axes and other weapons in their hands attacked the members of the Orthodox Ohrid Archbishopric, who were on their private property, and later, in front of the eyes of the police who were mutely standing by and watching, completely demolished the cabin, which is a private propery and which was a small chapel where people gathered to pray.

Before this happened, on seven occasions there was breaking and entering, robberies, murder threats and desecrations in the abovementioned cabin – chapel “Saint Nectarios of Aegina”. In all these cases, the policemen, who never identified themselves, played the part of a hidden collaborator with the attackers, threateningly exerting pressure for our moving out of our own private property.

Does it happen in any country in the Euro-Atlantic civilization that a person praying on a private property is terrorized by the state to which he is a taxpayer? Does the modern world know of such a line of religious discrimination and threats to the right to life, home and possession as in our reality, the Macedonian government continuously kills these elementary values?

 

The photographs, which are more than illustrative, show that, in the Republic of Macedonia, anyone can publicly execute the members of the Orthodox Ohrid Archbishopric with the support of the Macedonian government, and in a frighteningly similar way as in the time of the Nazism, when anyone could deprive of the right to life and possession the members of the discriminated religious and ethnic groups. This religious totalitarianism in the 21 century will remain noted as a phenomenon favored by the Macedonian government.

The purpose of this address is not only to inform, but also, and before all, it is an appeal to all the freedom-loving people, regardless of their religious, political and national affiliation or non-affiliation, to protect the right to religious freedom, the right to life and possession of all those citizens of the Republic of Macedonia, who momentarily face with their being tramped on and terrorized by the regime of this state.

In order to inspire prompt actions in all cases of violation of the basic religious freedoms and human rights, and in this concrete case when the Macedonian government, before the eyes of the global democratic public conducts a state terrorism on religious grounds, we will give the following example of a German intellectual from the time of Nazism: First they came for the Jews and I did not speak out because I was not a Jew; then they came for the Communists and I did not speak out because I was not a Communist; then they came for the trade unionists and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist; then they came for me and there was no one left to speak out for me.

http://www.poa-info.org