In Uhryniv a Church Dome Thrown on the Scrapheap. What Raiders Prepared for the Church in Hrybovytsia?

A notorious repair in the Holy Cross Church seized by the Kyiv Patriarchate in the village of Uhryniv, Volyn region, appears to have interested those who are responsible for the preservation of cultural monuments. Nearly a year after the self-proclaimed "owners" of the church, the UOC-KP activists and a local businessman, started repairs in the building, regional authorities were at least informed about the outcomes of their violent uncontrolled activity. It should be noted that so far the public has shown little interest in what is happening in the "autonomous principalities" on the border of Lutsk and Horokhiv districts. Couldn’t those who openly distorted the old church get away with such impunity?

"A desecrated church" – so bitterly call the "renovated" church the UOC parishioners. Since the seizure of the Holy Cross Church in September 2014, they have been attending worship services in the house of the priest, which the Kyiv Patriarchate also declared its property, thus “authorizing” “church patriots” to evict the priest’s family with two minor sons from it. Who cares about the preservation of architectural monuments?

Perhaps, the church in Uhryniv is not the only building subjected to such an abuse from invaders. In most cases, new "owners" are not very concerned about the maintenance of the building seized, but in Uhryniv village they immediately set “to work”. The question "why?" would rather be addressed to professional psychoanalysts because the Holy Cross Church was in entirely suitable condition: just before the capture the priest duly paid artists for a new wall painting. Assuming, the "urgent" repair was started for the supremacy of the Kyiv Patriarchate here only in order to expose the previous priest, the head of the UOC community, as a thief and who knows what, everything becomes clear. Yet, the delight has definitely turned too expensive: the church was deroofed and crowned with a gold-plated dome.

Without a doubt, distortion of the church will be silent or retransmitted to a grateful audience as another “victory” of “church patriots”. It is probably worth bringing to the discussion a leading media expert from the capital Lesia Hanzha, recently invited to one of the Volyn parishes where raiders inflated inter-faith conflicts and seized the UOC churches.

It's not only that the author didn’t provide any title documents in the material about the property conflict and provided invalid information as for the registration date of the UOC-KP community for the raider attack on the church. In the acclaimed analytical report with the eloquent title “Hrybovytsia does not want Moscow” Ms. Expert of among others cited the findings of one of the commissions involved in the conflict round the building. According to it, the replacement of the entrance doors to the church, done after the consultation with specialists, distorted the historical and cultural monument ... What does the experienced Kyiv journalist say of the removed roof and the glamorous dome placed instead of it, at the sight of which Uhryniv residents if not cry then cross themselves?

Even more interesting would be to learn how experts on religious conflicts would react on the fact that in another village in the region “church patriots” did not allow an ATO soldier to go to confession in the church blocked by the KP. Obviously, in such cases, journalists who report on the "victories" of the Kyiv Patriarchate see only those ATO militants who the raiders use to seizure churches as it was in Hrybovytsia?

However, we must return to Volyn realities. This coincided with the fact that superiors of the seized UOC churches in Hrybovytsia and Uhryniv were young priests, who 17 years ago almost at the same time were sent to these parishes to extinguish a conflict between the community and the priest. Father Rostyslav and Father Ihor even used to be groupmates in the seminary, and now find themselves in nearly identical difficult situations: their parishioners are too law-abiding, tactful and educated to resist the raiders; for the same reason the priests did not privatize the church houses, though they had all the legitimate right to it. In both churches worship was held in Ukrainian. So, what moved villages who suddenly became church “patriots” to fall into schism and seize the churches? Perhaps, personalities of the priests who then were transferred from the troubled parishes did not cause the problem?

Both superiors managed churches entrusted to them quite well. All repair work was carried out only with the permission of regulatory bodies, the state of the old Orthodox churches and the area around them, according to photos, financial records and videos, was quite decent. Since new “owners” invaded the Holy Protection Church literally the other day, the result of their innovative activity is too early to assess. But the fate of Uhryniv church is hardly to be envied.

On Christmas Eve of 2016 the roof with a dome demontaged from the Holy Cross Church was broken and thrown on the scrapheap. The “owners” are said to offer the timber to one of the needed villagers – for house heating, but the latter refused, of course. The initiators of the erection of a new patriotic glamour dome are spreading rumors that the previous priest allowed the roof ‘to decay” so much that only a timely intervention of the patriots saved the church of disaster. To refute this, the reporters of the Union of Orthodox Journalists went to the village cemetery, where fragments of a wooden structure was brought and put together with the trash, thus disregarding both memory of the late villagers and images of saints and decoration of the dome. Of course, as it goes, fragments of the old dome will be buried later. But the question "why" remains the first that is asked by those who is in the picture of what is going on.

It is difficult to understand why a long-suffering building was distorted with pseudo church glamour. But even casting a glance at a photo review, it becomes clear – it is not the church roof which is rotted in Uhryniv...

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