Jovan Nikolić (priest)

Jovan Nikolić (Cyrillic Јован Николић, d.) was a Serbian-Orthodox priest in Zagreb, Croatia, and the only Serbian-Orthodox priest to remain in Zagreb during the Croatia-Serbia war.

He was a critic of the leadership of the Serbian Orthodox Church,^[1] and advocate of peaceful coexistence between Serbs and Croats,^[2] but was accused by conservative clerics of being a Marxist.^[3]

As Serbian-Orthodox Archpriest in Zagreb in 1995 Nikolić denied rumours of mass conversions to Roman Catholicism,^[4] however in 1996 he acknowledged the devastating results of ethnic conflict on the Serbian Orthodox Church in Croatia to Christianity Today.^[5]

References

1. Paul Mojzes Balkan Genocides: Holocaust and Ethnic Cleansing in the Twentieth ... 2011- p266 "I heard this story in the summer of 1993 from a Serbian Orthodox priest, (the late) Reverend Jovan Nikolić, who decided to remain in Zagreb rather than flee. He was bitterly critical of the behavior of Serbian and Serb politicians and armies but even more so of the leadership of the Serbian Orthodox Church whom he charged with moral bankruptcy..."
2. Rénéo Lukic Europe from the Balkans to the Urals: The disintegration of ... 1996 p195 "... was forced on Croatia has also been made by Jovan Nikolic, a Serbian orthodox priest living in Zagreb. Nikolic, a tireless advocate of peaceful coexistence between Serbs and Croats, observed in 1992: The idea of an independent Croatia, a historic desire of the Croatian people, could not find understanding in the federal institutions, let alone in ..."
3. Vjekoslav Perica Balkan idols: religion and nationalism in Yugoslav states p182 "Cardinal Publić insisted that religion and religious organizations had nothing to do with the making of the Yugoslav conflict. ... Nikolaj Mrdja, in attacking unanimously several notable domestic clerics who were peace advocates as alleged "Marxists, communists, and Titoists" demanding that the international community exclude them from the peace process.69 Such... discredited clerics were, among others, the Bosnian Franciscan Marko Oršolić and the Serb-Orthodox priest from Croatia, Jovan Nikolić."
4. Croatia: Myth and Reality - Studia Croatica 1998 "Finally in early 1995, a Serb writer, Moma Dimic turned to pure fiction in the National Catholic Register while attempting to raise the specter of "ethnic cleansing" by stating that "Croatia's Catholic Church has already "converted" at least 11,000 Orthodox Christians." That statement was immediately denied by both Catholic and Serbian Orthodox leaders in Croatia. On January 11, 1995, Archpriest Jovan Nikolic of Zagreb stated that the rumor of conversions was "instrumented with lies, half-truths, misinformation" and stated flatly that such conversions had not taken place. Despite the words of both Catholic and Orthodox leaders, the myths of forced conversions and the wholesale destruction of Orthodox churches continued oughout the war."
5. Christianity Today Former Yugoslavia: Will Croatians Welcome Serbian Baptists Home? Nov 11, 1996 ... "Virtually all Catholic churches in the Krajina region were destroyed during Serb rule, beginning in 1991. Today, thieves are reselling in western Europe art stolen from abandoned Orthodox churches. "In 1990 we had one hundred and fifty Orthodox priests working within all Croatia," says Jovan Nikolic, a retired Serbian Orthodox priest in the Croatian capital Zagreb. "Today we have fifteen. None of them are active in Krajina, and no Orthodox services are being held there." Eastern Slavonia remains the last segment of Croatia still controlled by Serbs."