09 August 2005, 16:30
Adherents of unrecognized Kiev Patriarchate seized a church in western Ukraine
Ternopol, August 9, Interfax - Activists of the self-styled Kiev Patriarchate have seized the church of the Holy Trinity at the village of Rokhmaniv near Ternopol, western Ukraine.
With the support of the local authorities and in the presence of the police and the prosecutor’s officials, they have cut out the locks of the church doors and occupied it, Pravoslavie.ru has reported on Tuesday, citing the press-service of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.
Until now the church of the Holy Trinity was sealed and guarded by police. The local authorities assured the Orthodox community that the church would be returned to it if it agreed to conduct services in turn, but the faithful refused to let the Kiev Patriarchate adherents in the church.
Eight days before Lent this year, the rector of the church of the Holy Trinity, Archpriest Oleg Sirko, went on indefinite hunger strike in protest against the attempts to take away his church. His hunger strike lasted 57 days. On the Easter Sunday, Father Oleg was hospitalized in pre-coma.
Meanwhile the parishioners’ protests produced no effect as the court in Ternopol did not allow this community of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church to keep the church of the Holy Trinity at Rokhmaniv for itself.