About 200 parishioners of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) have been staunchly defending the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral in the town of Kamenetz-Podolsky, Khmelnytsky region, from being seized by followers of the schismatic Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU), according to a Telegram post by a Ukrainian publication.
The faithful, as can be seen from the post on Telegram, are singing prayer hymns and refusing to allow entry to OCU supporters.
The day before, the UOC indicated that attempts were being made to seize the cathedral by force. According to the Union of Orthodox Journalists, one of the female parishioners required hospitalization after OCU supporters aggressively shoved her.
About 100 people who had nothing to do with either the cathedral or the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church had gathered near the walls of the cathedral on Saturday, “voting” in favor of it being transferred to the OCU.
"About 200 parishioners of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) are standing at the entrance to the cathedral, holding the Ukrainian flag, singing prayers, and carrying out processions around the shrine, as they try to prevent local residents who favor the 'handover' to the UOC-KP from gaining access. Today there are about 50 of them. There were small clashes," local media reported.
The Union of Orthodox Journalists published a video showing one of the OCU supporters trying to squeeze through the throng of parishioners defending the cathedral and pushing them. Police could be seen standing by idly and not intervening.
Earlier, on April 2, the UOC was cited as saying that a crowd had tried to storm the cathedral in Khmelnitsky. Later, they said the clergy were escorted from the territory of the shrine, and those who stormed the cathedral held a meeting at which they voted for its transition to the schismatic structure of the post-coup regime's artificially constructed so-called Orthodox Church of Ukraine. The keys to the premises were ostensibly handed over to a "commission," which entered the church and began an inventory of the property.
The developments fall into the overall pattern of persecution that the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church is being subjected to. Referring to its links with Russia, local authorities in different regions of Ukraine, under the guidance of the Kiev regime, have opted to crack down on the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church, and a bill on its actual ban in Ukraine has been submitted to the country's parliament.
The Kiev regime has also imposed sanctions against some members of the UOC clergy. The Security Service of Ukrainian has begun opening criminal cases against the clergy, conducting so-called "counterintelligence activities," searching their homes, as well as churches and monasteries, in search of evidence of "anti-Ukrainian activities."
Thus, the situation around the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra - one of the oldest, largest, and historically most significant Orthodox Christian shrines in the world - escalated to a boiling point after the monks of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church refused to leave the monastery following the order of the directorate of the Kiev-Pechersk Historical and Cultural Preserve, the state-owned museum complex subordinate to Ukraine’s Ministry of Culture. On March 10, the monks were ordered to leave by March 29, after the reserve’s directorate announced the termination of the open-ended lease agreement with the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church, citing an alleged breach of contract.
The Russian Orthodox Church, the World Council of Churches, and Ukrainian opposition leaders have slammed the Zelensky government over the move.