Pochaev, Ternopil Province, Ukraine, October 9, 2025
Photo: vidviday.ua
The Ukrainian government and schismatics continue their campaign against the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church. Yesterday provided two more such examples when security forces carried out a search and nationalists attempted a seizure at one of the Church’s most important monasteries.
On October 8, officers from the Security Service of Ukraine and police conducted a search on the grounds of the Holy Dormition-Pochaev Lavra in Ternopil Oblast. According to Ternopil Pravda, citing sources in law enforcement agencies, the investigative actions took place at the Church of All Saints, located in the Lavra cemetery near the Lavra.
Law enforcement officials were reportedly searching for documents that could relate to alleged “illegal registration” of the church building, which holds the status of an architectural monument. According to the investigation’s version of events, in 2018 clergy of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church may have registered ownership of the church in violation of legislation, supposedly seizing the architectural monument through “fraudulent means.”
Also yesterday, unknown individuals attempted to seize the monastery’s administrative building. The attackers cut through locks on the gates with an angle grinder and attempted to penetrate inside, reports the Union of Orthodox Journalists.
However, a group of seminarians responded quickly and managed to prevent the breakthrough and to push the attackers back outside the gates. The attackers left but threatened to return with reinforcements.
Eyewitnesses report that the attackers included the head of the Kremenets division of the SBU, Sergei Zasyadko, as well as the head of the state-run Kremenets-Pochaev Preserve, Vasily Ilchishin.
The Pochaev Lavra, the second most important UOC monastery, has long been a target of authorities, schismatics, and Uniates seeking to seize the monastery from the Orthodox Church. In March 2023, the schismatic Orthodox Church of Ukraine established its own Pochaev Lavra on paper, following the same preliminary step it had taken regarding the Kiev Caves Lavra, from which the canonical Church was later expelled and the graceless schismatics installed themselves.
A commission from the Ministry of Culture and Information Policy inspected the Lavra in June 2024, ostensibly to check the condition of the monastery buildings. In January of this year, monastery representatives and Orthodox faithful prevented the Ministry of Culture from conducting an inventory of monastery property. Similar confrontations have continued in recent months as pressure on the monastery has intensified.
Despite the persecution, the people of the canonical UOC remain strong in faith. In August, 24 hierarchs, a host of clergy, and thousands of faithful went on pilgrimage to the Lavra to celebrate the 350th anniversary of the miraculous deliverance of the monastery from a Turkish-Tatar invasion in 1675.
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