Tbilisi/Agency Caucasus – The Georgian Catholic Church requested that the tension between Georgia and Abkhazia and South Ossetia should be decreased to entirely eliminate the likelihood of a regional war breaking out in the foreseeable future.
Ilia II, the current Catholicos-Patriarch of All Georgia and the spiritual leader of the Georgian Orthodox Church, called on Georgia, Abkhazia and Ossetia to establish a way of compromised dialogue well before the use of force leads them all to suffer from unrecoverable consequences.
"The Georgian Catholic Church has always tried its bets, and now it tries to re-establish confidence through peace negotiations so that we can all live together once again under the shadow of one single body of laws," the patriarch said on his May 4 sermon. "Neither resistance, nor armed conflict nor military operation can be tolerated. They will all lead to consequences from which recovery may never be possible."
The only way out is through setting up dialogues between the sides, said Ilia II. "God bless our country and peoples. May our brotherhood and unity be re-established soon. The more tense the situation is, the higher the likelihood of a military operation is. We will begin to pray from today onwards for peace and the protection of Georgia. We–Georgians, Abkhazians, Ossetians and other peoples–have lived together for ages and we have never experienced feelings of enmity. It is necessary to rely on love, worship and prayers to stop the seeds of enmity planted by the enemy itself from growing." KU/ÖZ/FT
