Top Ukraine Prelate : Vatican Rule on Same-Sex Blessing Affects Only Latin Church; Says Greek Cath. Church in Ukraine Has Its Own Rules

 Amid a broad spectrum of reactions unleashed by Fiducia Supplicans, a new Vatican document permitting non-liturgical blessings of same-sex couples,Ukraine's Greek Catholic Church -- the main Church of Ukraine -- has become the first eastern communion to  declare explicitly that the document does not apply outside the Latin Church,the Crux website reports today (Ded.24, 2023).  

"On the basis of canon. 1492 of the CCCC this Declaration concerns purely the Latin Church and has no legal force for the faithful of the Ukrainian Greek--Catholic Church," said Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, head of the Church, in a  Dec. 22 statement. 

Shevchuk was referring s  to a provision of the Code of Canons authority of the Church, in which the passive subject is not expressly indicated, affect only the Christian faithful of the Eastern Churches insofar as they treat matters of faith or morals or declarations of divine law , or these Christian faithful are explicitly included in these laws, or they grant favor which contains nothing contrary to the Eastern rites."