Beasts in Cassocks: The Crimes of the Heads of the Russian Greek Catholic Orthodox Church in America/Chapter 24

by John Feoktist Dudikoff

CHAPTER XXIV.

Platon Incites Pogroms

And, indeed, just as on the former occasion, so now, too, when I called on Platon the next day, I learned that he had disappeared. He was no longer in Moscow. Upon inquiry, I found out that he had left for Kiev. Although as captain of the Russian Army I had to hurry to rejoin my regiment, I determined instead to go to Kiev. On January 4, 1918, when H. Skoropadsky was the ruler of Kiev, in the presence of witnesses—I. M. Volia, Justice of the Peace of the 24th ward of Kiev; Attorney D. I. Lubansky, and N. I. Luzgin, Secretary of the Kiev Consistory, who, as it turned out later, were all his friends, Platon at last declared his willingness to repay me all the money he owed me. While the necessary papers were being drafted, Platon handed me 6,000 rubles of the Provisional Goxernment series, which hardly amounted to five American dollers, and asked me to wait for the papers. When the papers were ready, I was sumoned to the Justice of the Peace, I. M. Volia; D. I. Lubansky and N. I. Luzgin were also present. The justice asked me to sign the paper. I signed it, but received neither money

An Example of Platon's Attacks. Scene One.

nor a copy of the paper I had signed. Platon took all the papers with him and told me to come for the money a week later.

From January 18 and for two weeks following, Kiev was under continuous bombardment. In February the Bolsheviki came. During the bombardment I could not locate Platon anywhere. No one knew whether he was in hiding or left the town. Finally, in April, Hetman Skoropadsky captured the city with the aid of German troops. Friends told me they had seen Platon entering the city together with the troops. Indeed, a few days later, I saw Platon at the Sofia Place. Large crowds were assembled there. German soldiers, fully armed, were everywhere; on the roofs were machine guns. Apparently everything was in readiness to fire at the people

Scene Two.

at the very first signal. With difficulty I made my way through the crowd, and saw Metropolitan Platon in full regalia, with a cross in his hands, surrounded by priests and German soldiers. It was just after the thanksgiving mass for the liberation of Kiev from the Bolsheviki. Platon was preaching to the people, but good

Scene Three.

Scene Four.

Lord, what an inciting and repulsive sermon! The Metropolitan mispronounced the Ukrainian words. He cursed and anathemized the great Russians and those Ukrainians who were not in accord with him. He shouted that many Ukrainians, following the example of the "Katzaps" (Russians), fraternized with the Jews, disobeyed the Church authorities, and listened to the Rabbis instead; that they were breaking away from the power of the clergy and, consequently, from God Himself; that many of them had been circumcized by the rabbis, broken God's Commandments, and were robbing and killing the innocent landed proprietors, who, as edu-

Scene Five.

cated men, were the flower of Russia and the Ukraine; that, finally, they had dared raise their voices against Hetman Skoropadsky himself, who had been chosen by God and the saints of the Pechersk Monastery and who was the Savior of the Ukraine and the Orthodox Faith; that they dared resist the German soldiers whom God Himself sent to aid Skoropadsky and who though yesterday's enemies, forgot their animosity and came to bring about peace and order from chaos; and yet the people were unwilling to share with these friends God's gifts now, although they could not take them with them into the world to come. He cried, entreated, wept, implored not to spare the tempers, but to kill them just as good Christians kill the devils with the sign of the cross. "Whether it be your father, brother, or friend, don't spare them, since they themselves flagrantly burn, trample, desecrate their own mother the Church!"

Scene six.

This speech, full of venom and hatred, lasted for a goodly two hours. Without being cognizant of it, I was forced so far forward that Platon noticed me. His face became distorted with hatred, and he looked at me as if he were ready to make a dash for me and break my head with the large cross he had in his hand.

 

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