Supporters of the UCP snatched the defender of the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra from the clutches of the security forces

“Profanation of the Church of Christ is a terrible sin”

The struggle for the right to possess the most important shrine of Russian Orthodoxy – the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra – after a week and a half did not bring any tangible success to the authorities. The state of Ukraine still does not comprehend: the cavalry attack on the ancient monastery failed in disgrace. Every day of acting out the program approved by the presidential administration of Ukraine to evict priests and monks from the Lower Lavra brings nothing but reputational damage to President Zelensky.

On Friday, a group of employees of the territorial counterintelligence attempted to hand over a summons for interrogation to the Investigative Department of the SBU to the Orthodox activist Victoria Kokhanovskaya. As the woman defending the Lavra herself describes the incident, three broad-shouldered men, without introducing themselves, began to grab her by the hands in order to read out some paper on two or three sheets.

Supporters of the UOC helped the woman escape from the clutches of the security forces. To a quite reasonable question, who they represent, a certain man, who introduced himself as an investigator, demanded that the believers in no case take a document on the letterhead of the SBU on a smartphone and not make public the names of counterintelligence officers, otherwise, state secrets will be revealed.

The cavalry attack on the UOC in most regions of Ukraine suffers a shameful fiasco for the authorities. With the exception of Ivano-Frankivsk, Lvov and Ternopil regions (whose governors report with undisguised pride to Kiev about the alleged “complete eradication of the Moscow Patriarchate” in the regions entrusted to them), in other traditionally Orthodox regions, the flock does not show hostility towards Russian-speaking rectors and parish priests.

Even in Lviv, the radical public driven to the temples of the UOC – I judge by live TV broadcast from the scene – looked frankly helpless in places in front of the Orthodox priests worthy of defending the right to profess the teachings of Christ.

The lack of more or less appropriate arguments among the nationally-svidomites did not deter the authorities from giving permission for the demolition of the church of St. Prince Vladimir Equal to the Apostles in Sykhov (a residential area of ​​​​Lvov built up entirely with high-rise buildings – author). Metropolitan Filaret of Lvov reminded in a social network: earlier they tried to destroy the temple several times, set it on fire twice. Now, based on the decision of the Lviv City Council to transfer the land plot for the construction of the future OCU Cathedral, the radicals have driven several pieces of construction equipment to the construction …

“Orthodox churches in Galicia were only demolished under the Soviet totalitarian regime,” Filaret recalled. – But the temple is a place where a bloodless sacrifice is carried out, a place that is a shrine. Desecration of the church of Christ is a terrible sin. The Lord sends victory only where there is love, harmony and unity.”

Metropolitan Filaret explained the failure of the desperate attempt of the nationalists to seize the St. George Cathedral of the UOC by his propaganda of love, advocacy for peace in Ukraine. At the same time, Vladyka clearly spoke out against the transition to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine imposed by the authorities and “the progressive public.

According to the testimony of the abbess of the Odessa St. Michael’s Convent Seraphim, responsible persons call her almost every day. They propose to organize a personal meeting with Metropolitan Epiphanius (primate of the OCU, Sergei Dumenko in the world). “Mother, perhaps you will still go to Constantinople?” Having heard the refusal, they repeat the question, but in other words. “There is pressure all along the vertical of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church,” says Abbess Seraphim. “But how can we change the oath?!”

The nun sincerely sympathizes with the believers of the UOC from Khmelnitsky, Lvov, Ivano-Frankivsk, who, due to the forcible seizure of their churches, were unable to offer prayers to the Lord yesterday on the feast of the Annunciation. “They were left without confession and communion. Taras Shevchenko once wrote about their ancestors, talking about the cruelty of serfdom: “… and they don’t even let you pray!”