Metropolitan Feodosiy of Cherkasy and Kanev reported a “brutal crime against the Church” – the raiding of the Sretensky Church of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church in the city of Cherkasy on August 3, 2023. The bishop’s video message was published by the diocesan channel “Cherkasky Blagovestnyk” on YouTube.

“Perhaps, after the recent expulsion of the Cherkasy Sisters of Mercy, when they were thrown out of the church and into the city hospital of Cherkasy, this is the second largest crime committed by the persecutors of the Church in our city,” said Metropolitan Feodosiy.

According to the bishop, the Sretensky church was “stolen from the Cherkasy diocese” by a raiding scheme that was carried out in the villages: deputies of the city council, budget officials, people “who have nothing to do with the churches at all”, held in June at the stadium not far from the church the assembly, which was called a parish assembly, after which it was registered in the protocol and, under the signature of an official, changes were made to the state register.

On August 3, after illegal registration, the invaders “in a naked crowd with the support of the security forces, broke into the Sretensky church and seized it by force, broke the locks and threw the long-time abbot, a priest with seven children, out of the parish house into the street.”

Metropolitan Feodosiy emphasized that those who today are taking over Orthodox shrines are “unbelieving people” who “do not understand the nature of the Church.”

“They see in the Church only assets, real estate, religious buildings, plots of land, weak and strange people who for some reason are not looking for the earthly, but for the heavenly. They do not believe in God, and in the Church they see only the earthly, the framework, not understanding the nature of the Church,” the hierarch noted.

Metropolitan Feodosiy called on believing Orthodox people to remember this time, which not every generation of Christians has to experience, as “absolutely special and incredible”, when the Lord is “extremely close to each of our praying and grieving hearts”.

“We will return to our churches again when the spiritual occupiers leave them,” the archpastor expressed conviction. – This time will surely end, and a new one will begin, also joyful, also blessed. But the prayer and closeness of God that we will experience during persecution will be incomparable to anything. We will remember them later for the rest of our lives, we will live with this memory. Do not be discouraged, brothers and sisters, we are standing on the threshold of great joy.”