“Ktrich Nersisyan (referring to Catholicos Karekin II – ed.) has long been defrocked; he is simply a person who, together with a group of others who have also been defrocked, seized the Mother See,” Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said on October 22 during government session hours.

He emphasized that the government is not in conflict with the Armenian Apostolic Church itself, but with those who desecrate it.

Pashinyan expressed his belief that today in Armenia, either there is no spiritual life, or it is very difficult to find.

“On the one hand, we talk about the need for a society oriented toward values, but how is that possible if the environment is corrupted? Events in recent months have shown that Hovhannavank is a place where one can live a spiritual life. The slanderous apparatus led by Ktrich Nersisyan was unable to defame the spiritual activities of Father Aram Asatryan.

Hovhannavank, like many other monuments, is under the government’s balance. Several churches have been provided for free use to the Armenian Apostolic Church.

Where there is no spiritual life, where heresies are propagated and young ‘fake’ accounts operate, there are all legal and moral grounds to return such monuments to the public. We will support Father Aram and others like him so that they can restore genuine spiritual life in Armenia. I, as a citizen of Armenia, see the need for a spiritual platform. That place exists, and I will try to verify my impressions.

As for being deprived of it, a person who is deprived cannot deprive others. Ktrich Nersisyan (referring to Catholicos Karekin II – ed.)is deprived of it for violating the vow of servitude. How can he deprive anyone else? Let him explain to the public how he has a wife and children,” Pashinyan concluded.