Pashinyan launches ‘coordinating council’ to oust Catholicos

By Elen Muradyan

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan escalated his public campaign to remove Catholicos Karekin II, the spiritual leader of the Armenian Apostolic Church, announcing the formation of a council aimed at organizing his ouster on Tuesday.

In a Facebook post, Pashinyan called on churchgoers to help “liberate the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin” and elect a new Catholicos, outlining a process to establish a Coordinating Council of loyal followers to advance the effort.

“As one of you, I appeal to all faithful followers of the Armenian Apostolic Church,” Pashinyan wrote. “We must take practical steps to free the Catholicosate and organize new elections. The time has come.”

The Prime Minister laid out strict spiritual criteria for membership in the council, including belief in Jesus Christ, daily prayer, and full Lenten fasting at least once in the last five years. He also stipulated that any celibate clergy involved must not have broken their vow, a pointed reference to his ongoing accusations that the current Catholicos has fathered a child.

“The responsibility for selecting the first ten members of the council will rest with me,” he said, pledging to rely on personal conversations and “the eyes of the soul” to determine candidates’ sincerity. 

The move follows Pashinyan’s social media post on Monday, in which he accused Karekin II of violating his monastic vow and promised to provide evidence if the Catholicos denies it. The Church’s canons require bishops and the Catholicos to remain celibate, and Pashinyan argues that any breach invalidates Karekin’s position.

“This is a fact,” he said. “If he denies it, I will prove it in the appropriate format.”

The Armenian Apostolic Church has rejected the accusations as politically motivated. In a statement last week, its Supreme Spiritual Council condemned Pashinyan’s rhetoric, warning that his confrontational stance was eroding social cohesion.

“The Prime Minister has once again launched an offensive against the Armenian Apostolic Holy Church, employing language and accusations that are unbecoming of a public official,” the statement said.

While Karekin II has not directly responded to Pashinyan’s most recent remarks, Church leaders say the campaign is part of a broader effort to weaken the institution, which has been critical of the government’s handling of the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war and its aftermath.

Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan, a key church figure, led protests last year demanding Pashinyan’s resignation, a move widely seen as having received tacit support from the Catholicos. In response, the government has threatened to reassess the Church’s tax privileges and oversight rules.

The latest rift comes just days after Karekin II’s speech at a cultural event in Switzerland, where he condemned Azerbaijan’s ethnic cleansing of Armenians from Nagorno-Karabakh in 2023 and called for their right of return, comments that appeared at odds with the Armenian government’s current diplomatic approach.

Despite intensifying political attacks, recent polling from the Caucasus Barometer shows the Armenian Apostolic Church remains the country’s most trusted institution. Analysts warn, however, that continued conflict risks undermining both religious unity and the state’s democratic image.

“This is not simply a church-state dispute,” journalist Karpis Pashoyan told CivilNet. “It’s a reflection of a broader crisis, where political discourse has become personal and impulsive, rather than institutional and rational.”