U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine: I want to understand as much as I can about all different religious traditions in Ukraine

Newly appointed U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Geoffrey Pyatt from the very beginning of his mission has shown a keen interest in the religious situation in the country. On August 15 he presented his credentials to President Yanukovych. During this month, the ambassador held meetings with Patriarch Sviatoslav Shevchuk of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, Chief Rabbi of Ukraine Yaakov Dov Bleich, and the mufti of Ukraine.

Geoffrey Pyatt took part in a ceremony on September 2 to present a U.S. Ambassadors Fund for Cultural Preservation grant to the Institute of Drohobych and the Drohobychchyna Museum for the restoration and preservation of original murals of an outstanding Ukrainian historical and artistic monument -- the wooden Church of St. George. During his visit to Lviv, Ambassador Pyatt visited a Memorial to Victims of the Janowska Concentration Camp and the site of the Lviv ghetto.

“One of the things which are interesting to me about the Ukrainian society and Ukrainian traditions is how religious traditions are threaded throughout that. For the United States a critical principle is religious tolerance and religious inclusions and I think one of the things Ukrainian can be proud of is the fact that they have built a society which is multireligious – Orthodox, Catholics, Jewish history, Muslims. Holding on to that, celebrating that I think is an important job for me as an American Ambassador and it also an important part of what makes Ukraine a society as it is today so I want to understand as much as I can about all these different religious traditions,” the ambassador said in the comment to RISU during the dedication of the new building of the Ukrainian Catholic University.