Kreschatik, Chernivtsi Province, Ukraine, October 19, 2020
Photo: npu.gov.ua
The abbot of a monastery of the Chernivtsi Diocese of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church went missing over the weekend and a search is underway.
On Saturday, October 17, a relative of Archimandrite Seraphim (Dudka), the abbot of the St. John the Theologian Monastery in the village of Kreshatik, contacted the police, reporting that Fr. Seraphim never returned from fishing on the Dniester River the day before.
Rescuers, police, and volunteers are actively searching for the missing 46-year-old abbot, reports the site of the Ukrainian National Police.
The monastery reported that they found the boat Fr. Seraphim was using.
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The St. John the Theologian Monastery was founded in the 12th century by three monks who took up the ascetic life at the site of a healing spring along the Dniester River. They lived in caves that they dug themselves. On the eve of the feast of St. John the Theologian, the monks beheld a Heavenly glow over the spring, and taking it as a sign, they named their monastery after the beloved disciple.
The monastery was closed due to a conflict with the bishop and was only revived in the first half of the 18th century. The monastery was closed again in 1786 when the western part of Bukovina was annexed to the Habsburg monarchy and the monastery church was converted into a parish.
The monastery reopened again by order of the Holy Synod of the Romanian Orthodox Church in 1931. A few monks labored in the skete until it was closed again in 1960. The monastery buildings were used as a recreation center.
The monastery territory was returned to the church in 1989, and on August 7, 1991, the Holy Synod of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church decided to restore the monastery.
Archimandrite Seraphim has served as abbot of the monastery since 2014.