Kiev, May 13, 2021
Photo: spzh.news
The Holy Synod of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church held its first session of the year yesterday at the Kiev Caves Lavra under the chairmanship of His Beatitude Metropolitan Onuphry of Kiev and All Ukraine.
Among the issues dealt with was the canonization of a new saint. The autonomous UOC has its own independent and fully functioning Holy Synod that has the authority to canonize its own saints.
According to the Synodal report: “In response to the report of the ruling hierarch of the Zhytomyr Diocese, the Holy Synod blessed the local veneration within the Zhytomyr Diocese of St. Eumenius (Khorolsky), Archbishop of Zhytomyr and Ovruch, establishing the day of his memory as August 25 according to the new style.”
Materials concerning the life and podvigs of St. Eumenius had been examined by the UOC’s Commission for the Canonization of Saints in February and forwarded at that time to Met. Onuphry and the Holy Synod for further consideration.
The Ukrainian Church also canonized 5 ascetics of piety from the Sumy and Alexandria Dioceses in December. In March 2020, three new saints were canonized and approved for local veneration in the Kamensk Diocese.
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St. Eumenius was born on December 13, 1886, in the Kherson Governorate. He received his initial education in a parochial school, after which he graduated from a pedagogical school. He then entered Holy Trinity Monastery in Kiev as a novice.
After fulfilling his military service, he then became the personal secretary to Bishop Dionysiy of Saratov in 1912. Six years later, he entered St. Michael’s Monastery in Kiev, where he was tonsured and ordained to the diaconate in 1919. In 1923, he transferred to the Kiev Caves Lavra, and the next year he was sent to the Lavra’s dependency in Petrograd to serve as archdeacon.
He was arrested on the night of August 22-23, 1930. Later, in March 1950, he was ordained as a hieromonk and appointed as dean of the Kiev Caves Lavra. He was elevated to the rank of archimandrite in January 1954, and the next month he was consecrated as the bishop of Chernivtsi and Bukovina.
On December 9, 1958, he was elevated to the rank of archbishop and appointed Archbishop of Zhytomyr and Ovruch.
He reposed in the Lord on August 25, 1967, and was buried behind the alter of the church in the Zhytomyr cemetery.
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