In Chernihiv, OCU demands that the city authorities hand over the house of St. Lawrence of Chernihiv to them

Representatives of the OCU in Chernihiv are demanding that local authorities expropriate and transfer to them the house where St. Lawrence of Chernihiv lived. The OCU believes that this property is currently used by a public organization associated with the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which, in their opinion, is unacceptable. This is reported by the publication Chernihiv Time.

It is reported that in early October, a well-known OCU cleric in Chernihiv, Yevhen Orda, accused the Chernihiv authorities of promoting the “spiritual expansion of Russian Orthodoxy.” The representative of the OCU was outraged by the refusal signed by the head of the land resources of the Chernihiv City Council Vasyl Dmytrenko to transfer a land plot at 38 Illinska Street (where the house of St. Lawrence of Chernihiv is located – ed.) for a long-term lease to one of the public organizations associated with the OCU. The head of the land department justified his refusal by the fact that the property located on this plot is privately owned, and its owner is the public organization “Care and Faith”. Yevhen Orda, for his part, connects this organization with the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.

“I asked to consider the issue of leasing the land on which the house of St. Lawrence is located. By doing so, I sought to stop the transfer of this land to the UOC organization, disguised as the charity fund “Care and Faith,” headed by a priest of the Moscow Patriarchate, Fedir Mandziuk. Instead, the Chernihiv City Council, namely the head of the land resources department Vasyl Dmytrenko, rejected my request, given “…the lack of supporting information …. regarding the affiliation of this organization with an organization disguised from society,” – Orda is indignant.

As reported earlier, the Holy Trinity Cathedral of Chernihiv, which was previously taken away from the Chernihiv Diocese of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, is to be opened to visitors as a museum in the near future. The process of “deconservation” of the religious building will take place gradually.