On June 9, 2024, a meeting of the Diocesan Council, headed by Metropolitan Theodosius of Cherkassy and Kanevsky of Cherkassy and Kanev, was held in the premises of the diocesan administration of the Cherkassy diocese of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. During the meeting, those present discussed ways to protect and counter attempts of future seizures of UOC churches on the territory of the diocese. About it reports the official website of the Cherkassy diocese of the UOC.
“The first issue on the agenda was the discussion of potential risks of raiders seizures of city temples. As it became known, the raiders are preparing a scheme of legal appeal of ownership rights to the temples legally belonging to the Cherkassy diocese, in view of the “improper registration” in due time the construction of these temples by the late head of the diocese Metropolitan Sophrony. There was also discussed information about forced collection of signatures by certain persons from employees of budgetary organizations and pensioners served by them under the fictitious “Protocol” about their alleged belonging to the religious community of Cherkassy Cathedral. Such actions cannot be regarded otherwise as another attempt to implement a well-known raider scheme of illegal forgery of church documents. In this regard, the lawyers of Cherkassy diocese will initiate an investigation and criminal proceedings on this fact with the subsequent bringing of guilty persons to criminal responsibility under the relevant article of the Criminal Code of Ukraine”, – said in the message of the diocesan press service.
We will remind, earlier we reported that on June 6, 2024, under the walls of the Sosnovsky district court of Cherkassy, supporters of the OCU arranged an “action” of protest during the next court session on the case of Metropolitan of Cherkassy and Kanev Theodosius. During the protests, the OCU “activists” physically injured the UOC believers who came to the court to support their ruling bishop. As a result of aggressive actions by OCU supporters, the arm of a local parishioner, an icon painter and architect of the UOC Cherkassy Cathedral, was broken.
