On April 26th, hundreds of thousands of Catholics gathered in Rome to pay their respects to Pope Francis. He was the head of the Catholic Church from March 2013 to April 2025.
During his tenure, Pope Francis advocated for social justice, climate change and the rights of marginalized groups. He was a progressive in the Catholic Church, where he looked to be more inclusive of various communities around the world. The erstwhile pope worked hard to strengthen relationships with multiple countries, and he was mostly seen as a reformer in the Catholic Church. Given his humble attitude and progressive stance on various issues, Pope Francis and his policies were usually viewed favourably by the wider Catholic community. In short, he worked to improvement the Catholic Church to be more accepting and open to all.
For the Ukrainian community, however, Pope Francis left a more complicated legacy. Elected in March 2013, he was seen in Ukraine as individual who could possibly bring about genuine change, as east Catholics looked to form stronger connections with the Vatican. There are nearly 5 million Catholics in Ukraine, and for respective years, they had felt forgotten. But throughout the tenure of Pope Francis, the Ukrainians were inactive left disappointed.
What happened? Before the election of Pope Francis, his predecessor Pope Benedict XVI was the head of the Church. During his tenure, a crucial event occurred in the occurred in the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. In February 2011, Cardinal Liubomyr Huzar announced that he would resign from his post due to wellness reasons. The announcement presented Pope Benedict XVI with an chance to appoint a fresh cardinal of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. While the pope confirmed Auxiliary Bishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk to be the head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, he was not named a cardinal.
Pope Francis besides upheld this decision. In fact, the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church would not have a fresh cardinal until autumn 2024. In another words, the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church needed to wait for 13 years before a successor was appointed, which was viewed poorly by the community.
But the controversy surrounding Pope Francis and his relation with Ukraine did not end there. During his tenure, the erstwhile pope witnessed the illegal annexation of Crimea and the Russian invasion of Donbas in 2014. This provided him and the Vatican with an chance to take a stance on these events. Instead, the Ukrainian community was left with further disappointment. During Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea, Pope Francis failed to condemn Moscow’s aggressive actions. Instead, he called for “dialogue and harmony” between Russia and Ukraine, hoping they would scope a peaceful solution.
Following these events, Pope Francis continued to make blanket statements about Moscow and Kyiv, calling for peace between the 2 countries during the first Russian invasion. The erstwhile pope failed to admit that the war was caused by the Russian Federation, and at 1 point, he even opted to meet with Russian Patriarch Kirill, the head of the country’s Orthodox Church. During their exchange in Cuba in February 2016, the 2 spiritual leaders issued a joint statement. The paper read that both parties discussed “the common relations between the Churches”, and that they would search to build on this gathering and the relation between their organizations.
The gathering was of large importance for the Ukrainian community. At the time, Russia had launched its first invasion of Donbas in spring 2014. Thousands of Ukrainian citizens in east Ukraine had been killed due to Russian aggression, and according to global experts, winter 2016 was a particularly violent period during the war. While Pope Francis had an chance to talk with Patriarch Kirill to call for an end to the Donbas invasion, he said nothing. In addition, Pope Francis would not visit Ukraine during his tenure as the head of the Catholic Church from March 2013 to April 2025. This led to greater confusion in the Ukrainian Catholic community, as members could not comprehend why Pope Francis would have prioritized a gathering with Patriarch Kirill, a known friend of Russian president Vladimir Putin and individual who had supported Russia’s incursion into Ukraine.
Things then seemed to turn in 2018, erstwhile news broke that the Orthodox community in Ukraine would search “autocephaly”. For generations, the Orthodox Church of Ukraine was a sect that was a part of the wider Orthodox Church of Russia. many spiritual sites, churches and community centres throughout Ukraine belonged to the Russian Orthodox Church. However, as the Russian invasion of Donbas became even more deadly, the Ukrainians sought to establish greater independency and break distant from Russia’s spiritual realm.
Ukraine’s push for autocephaly was supported by Patriarch Bartholomew, the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople. Then, after consulting with another Orthodox communities, the synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate announced that it would grant this fresh position to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, much to the dismay of its Russian counterpart. While the Catholic Church and Orthodox Church are separate entities within Christianity, and although the Catholic Church had no say in the substance of Orthodoxy in Ukraine, the Vatican supported Ukrainian efforts. In a message issued by the Holy See, the Vatican announced that it would admit the autocephaly of the Orthodox Church in Ukraine. This was welcomed by the Ukrainian community.
Outside of this event, Pope Francis, in his later years, worked to strengthen relations with the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church by appointing a fresh cardinal, and Ukraine’s first, since 2011. Consistent in his messaging of amplifying voices and communities around the world, the erstwhile pope would name Bishop Mykola Bychok as the next cardinal in the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. Prior to Bychok, the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church had only had 5 erstwhile cardinals, meaning that the decision made by Pope Francis was historical and significant. It suggested that the Vatican had not forgotten about the Ukrainian Catholic community, and that the Holy See was serious about strengthening relations with lesser-represented communities within the Catholic Church.
Aside from Pope Francis’s support for an autocephalous Orthodox Church in Ukraine and the appointment of the first Ukrainian Catholic cardinal since 2011, the relation between the Holy See and Ukraine waned during the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. erstwhile the war began in February 2022, Pope Francis called for peace and dialog between Russia and Ukraine. This is akin to what he had done during the annexation of Crimea and the Russian invasion of Donbas. As the war progressed, the pope failed to condemn Russia’s actions. Instead, he was guilty of repeating Russian talking points about the war.
For example, during the early stages of the war, Pope Francis suggested that there may have been any kind of provocation that forced Russia to launch its invasion. The pope besides indicated that he believed that Ukraine was being used as a pawn between NATO and Russia. Both of these statements are false, however, as the global community mostly agrees that the Russian invasion of Ukraine was an unprovoked, unnecessary and illegal war started by Russia.
There were further blunders. During the war, Pope Francis held a video conference with young Russian Christians. While on the call, the pope reminded those present about Russian history. “Never forget your heritage,” Pope Francis said. He would proceed by stating that “You are heirs to large Russia: the Russia of saints, rulers, the vast Russia of Peter I, Catherine II – an empire that was great.” The comments upset millions of Ukrainians, as the Russian Empire besides sought to destruct the Ukrainian language. Thousands of cultural Ukrainians were besides imprisoned and enslaved during this period.
Finally, there was the infamous incidental in 2024, erstwhile Pope Francis called on the Ukrainians to submit to the Russian invasion. In his statement, the pope said that the Ukrainians should have “the courage of the white flag”, believing that the Ukrainians should be forced into negotiations with the Russians. While it is understandable why the pope would have called for peace, as Russia’s war has brought death and demolition to Ukraine, capitulating to those liable for the war is not the appropriate solution.
These statements by Pope Francis were viewed as harmful by members of the Ukrainian Catholic community (and Ukrainians more broadly). To these Christians, it felt as if the pope should have taken a more rigid stance on Russia, condemning Moscow for the war. They were left puzzled by the pope’s repeated Russian narratives on the conflict, and they did not realize why he continued to talk with the Russian Patriarch Kirill.
It is crucial to note that the Vatican has provided thousands of euros in humanitarian and medical aid to Ukraine throughout the invasion. While this assistance has been welcomed, it did not make up for the pope’s comments on the war. Instead, many Ukrainian Catholics were left disappointed by Pope Francis, hoping that something different would come.
Overall, Pope Francis has left a mixed legacy with Ukrainians. He supported the autocephaly of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, appointed a fresh cardinal in the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church after a 13-year absence, and approved humanitarian and medical assistance from the Holy See to Ukraine during Russia’s full-scale invasion. He helped Russia and Ukraine with prisoner exchanges, and he even secretly donated funds to acquisition drones for the Ukrainian army.
But for many Ukrainians, these actions were not enough. The pope’s failure to take a harder stance on Russia, his decision to repeat the Russian communicative on the war, and his meetings with Patriarch Kirill, a known supporter of the Russian invasion, were unacceptable. Now, as a fresh pope has been elected in the Vatican, many Ukrainians are hopeful that something will change.
Mark Temnycky is simply a nonresident fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Eurasia Center and an accredited freelance journalist covering Eurasian affairs.
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