News

Sumy-Kyiv – A delegation of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad (ROCA), headed by Metropolitan Lavr of New York, head of the ROCA, arrived in Ukraine on 23 May 2007. The ROCA on 17 May signed an act of canonical communion with the Russian Orthodox Church.

In northern Ukraine’s Sumy Region, on the Ukrainian-Russian border, the delegation was received by Bishop Luka of Vasylky, vicar of the Kyiv Metropolitanate and pastor of the Church of the Nativity of the Mother of God in the Hlynska Hermitage, which was visited by the metropolitan and clergy of the ROCA and Archbishop Herman of Kursk and Rylsk.

Metropolitan Lavr noted: “Now I feel that I have come to the Ukrainian land, the holy places of which I visited many times before unofficially. It has been a long-awaited visit, during which we would like to get acquainted with the life of the Orthodox church in Ukraine and honor the great sanctuaries, the Kyivan Monastery of the Caves and the Pochaiv Lavra [Major Monastery].”

On 24 May 2007 at the Dormition Church of the Kyivan Monastery of the Caves, the guests attended a Liturgy headed by Metropolitan Volodymyr (Sabodan), head of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church-Moscow Patriarchate (UOC-MP), and Metropolitan Lavr, and concelebrated by Metropolitan Onufrii of Chernivtsi and Bukovyna, Archbishop Auhustyn of Lviv and Halych, Archbishop Pavlo, superior of the Kyivan Monastery of the Caves, Bishop Hurii of Zhytomyr and Novohrad-Volynskyi, Bishop Antonii of Boryspil, and numerous priests.

Metropolitan Volodymyr stressed the importance of uniting the divided parts of the Russian church. Metropolitan Lavr said that the faithful of the ROCA have long waited for a chance to pray together in the most ancient church of Kyivan Rus, the Kyivan Monastery of the Caves. In his commentary on the visit of the head of the ROCA to Ukraine, Metropolitan Onufrii, head of the Canonical Commission at the Synod of the UOC-MP, said that it has been a truly epochal event, which the faithful of both churches had awaited for almost 80 years.

As part of the visit the delegation is going to visit Kyiv holy places, meet students of Kyivan spiritual schools, and go to the Pochaiv Lavra.

Sources and previous related RISU news: