“Under the circumstances set forth, the eviction of the monks, the groundless sealing and restriction of access to the premises contain signs of a criminal offense — arbitrariness,” Chekman said.
In its own statement, the Ukrainian Ministry of Culture asked the police to “take preventative measures” against the unknown people who blocked access to the buildings, which had until recently housed workshops where monks make icons and vestments used in religious services. Kalonger said the buildings should be considered religious spaces because they supply the church with necessary items and provide income to the monks, who sell items to pilgrims.
RELATED: In Bitter Wartime Winter, Missionary Warms Ukrainians With Stoves, Blankets
At noon on Wednesday, hundreds gathered to pray outside the buildings, Kalonger said.
The fight over the monastery reflects the larger split between the UOC and OCU, both of which claim they are the largest Orthodox church in Ukraine. Data on individual parish loyalties is difficult to verify. In April, Metropolitan Vladyka Anthony, chancellor of the UOC, told RNS that parishes switching between the two groups had led to violence among their members and priests.
“We have a war now and people are closing down churches, split between which are loyal and unloyal,” Anthony said at the time. “This does not help the unification of Ukrainians. How can a soldier fight for Ukraine when he knows his mother is getting beaten up for attending UOC?”
In December, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced that a law had been drafted that could have banned UOC activities, but it was never adopted, evidence that Maksym Vasin, executive director of the Institute for Religious Freedom in Ukraine, offered as proof that the Ukrainian government had not to that point violated the religious freedom of the UOC.
But Metropolitan Pavlo, the former abbot of the Kyiv Pechersk Lavra, has been under house arrest since April 1 for charges of inciting religious enmity and denying Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine, and particular priests and hierarchs have been accused of spreading Russian propaganda justifying the war, among other crimes.
This article originally appeared here.
