Let Them Defend Their Flock, Not Recall Christianity by Building a Church, Says Manukyan on Moscow Cinema Open-Air Hall’s Fate

“Regular youth fight against all kinds of negative occurences, and it’s impossible that [their] struggles won’t lead to any results,” Garik Manukyan, chairperson of Sargis Tkhruni Youth Student Union of the Social Democratic Hnchak Party, told Tert.am.

Earlier, Sargis Tkhruni members had joined a youth initiative that had launched a campaign to collect signatures, demanding the Moscow Cinema Open-Air Hall not be demolished and replaced with a church.

“There is no shortage of churches in Yerevan. It would be better if those who are building the church, the benefactors, reconstruct those churches in Armenia which are of great historical and cultural value and are in need of reconstruction,” said Garik Manukyan, advising benefactors to invest their money toward that aim.

“Let our spiritual fathers stand guard over their flock when they were being shot at, [and] not recall Christianity only by building a church. Christianity, first of all, is kindness, love for people, but we didn’t see that love on March 1,” said Manukyan.