“We call on everyone to be strong in faith, to intensify their prayers and to protect by all legal methods our most precious sanctuary – the Holy Dormition Kiev-Pechersk Lavra. May the Lord, through the prayers of the Venerable Fathers of the Kiev -Pechersk, help us all in the noble cause of the unshakable position on the stone of faith, filling it with the fruits of justice to the glory and praise of God,” the synod of the UOC addressed to the faithful on the Church’s website.
He also notes that monks are “kicked out of their homes, hiding behind wacky, non-existent arguments.”
“Large-scale pressure on the believers of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church is increasing, and today we call on all of you, beloved brothers and sisters in Christ, with a word of living love and a call to firm faith and steadfast, who does not preach discord, but unity, not wickedness, but reconciliation, not cruelty, but mercy,” the call emphasizes.
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Over 200 monks and novices, hundreds of future priests – students of the Kiev Theological Academy and Seminary – live in the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra. It also houses the administrative center of the Canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church and the residence of its head, Metropolitan Onufry of Kiev and All Ukraine.