OCU Synod announces foundation of three monasteries

On May 12, 2025, during a meeting of the Synod of the OCU, the organization decided to establish three monasteries. It is noteworthy that one of them, apparently, is a fictitious “clone” of the capital’s Holy Trinity St. John’s Monastery of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church in the Botanical Garden, whose abbot is Archbishop Jonah (Cherepanov) of Obukhiv. This is reported by the organization’s website.

It is reported that at the suggestion of Epiphany Dumenko, the Synod of the OCU founded the Stavropegial Monastery in honor of St. Jonah of Kyiv, determining that it is directly subordinate to the head of the OCU.

Also, the Synod of the OCU established the Babianets Monastery of St. Michael the Archangel as part of the Ivano-Frankivsk-Halych Diocese, and the Holy Cross Monastery was founded in the Kharkiv-Poltava Diocese.

Earlier, the OCU lobbyist and freelance expert of the State Service of Ukraine for Ethnic Policy and Freedom of Conscience (DESS) Andriy Smirnov said that the OCU registers legal “clones” of monasteries of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church to make it easier for the state to transfer the property of the UOC to the OCU. Smirnov believes that the state has the full right to dispose of the property of monasteries as it pleases, and the OCU should always be ready to accept monasteries or churches taken from the UOC.