I am happy to know personally His Beatitude, and every day, I wonder how wisdom and simplicity, firmness and kindness, will and humility are organically combined in this man.

By Providence, it is he whom the Lord has blessed to head the multi-million flock of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church in these most hard times.

The election of the Primate was held in August 2014 at an already rather intense moment of Ukrainian history. Back then, the authorities were trying to actively influence the country's church life and were promoting their candidate — an “effective manager”. But by God's will, the lot fell to a true monk and man of prayer, who knew from experience what it meant to follow Christ by the only saving Royal path. And time proves the correctness of this choice. The Lord has so made that a monk and man of prayer has turned out to be both a wise church manager and a reasonable church politician.

Only he who truly loves his God can truly love his neighbour. War, as an extreme manifestation of human conflicts, strictly polarises society. It is the hardest today for true Christians, who seek first and foremost the Truth of God and the Kingdom of Heaven. When you bow down to none of the earthly rulers, when you do not give your heart away to any passioned ideology, cloud your mind with any propaganda, put on pink glasses, or hysterically shout out slogans, but quietly whisper prayers for your native land and your native people — you are beaten by both those from the right and those from the left. Our Primate goes through all of it every day.

Constant external pressure, attempts to tear apart and destroy our Church and to exchange what is eternal for what is temporary, a desire to crush the hierarchy established over centuries, the resulting wavering of part of the hierarchs and priests, and pain for his suffering flock — this is the heavy burden on the shoulders of the Primate. And no man could bear it save for the strengthening power of the grace of God and the prayerful support of millions of brothers and sisters in Ukraine and all over the Orthodox world.

Prayer is the hardest and the main labour, unparalleled to any other. Its fruit is incomparable grace.

Metropolitan Onufriy does not collect awards from the authorities or likes on social media and does not try to be liked by or please everyone. He strives only to remain God's own. And that is why our Primate is on his place — at the Throne of the Lord, in prayer for all of us: for the persecuted Ukrainian Orthodox Church, for his brothers hierarchs, for the clergy and laity, for the soldiers and their families, and for those who have lost their homes and their loved ones.

He is that good shepherd who humbly bears his cross and tries to preserve the Church of Christ entrusted to him and to prevent her from being turned into a graceless earthly organisation, into another department of state.

The Lord will not forsake His sincere and zealous servant. Let us not forsake him too — with our prayers and our fraternal support!

Your Beatitude, I wholeheartedly greet you on your birthday!

On this remarkable day, I wish you spiritual joy and peace of heart, strength and health! May the Lord save you for many and blessed years!