Hundreds of processions held on Triumph of Orthodoxy in Rivne Diocese

On March 21, 2021, on the first Sunday of Great Lent, hundreds of processions were held in the Rivne diocese of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church in honor of the Triumph of Orthodoxy, the UOJ correspondent reports.

With the blessing of Metropolitan Bartholomew of Rivne and Ostrog, prayer processions took place in almost every parish of the diocese.

Traditionally, on the Week of the Triumph of Orthodoxy, believers gather for a general diocesan procession in Rivne, which was not held this year due to the tightening of quarantine restrictions. However, as they say in the diocese, hundreds of religious processions took place at the same time in the villages and cities of the Rivne region.

A lot of priests of the Rivne diocese wrote about the advantages of the forced changes on their pages on social networks, including the head of the social department at the Rivne diocese of the UOC, Archpriest Vasily Nachev.

“For example, I'll take our parish: 10-20 people could go to Rivne for the procession,” the priest noted. “There were about 100 pilgrims at the service in the church today, and all of them became participants in the procession around the church. Accordingly, this year the number of participants in the cross procession in the Rivne diocese is several times greater than in the past. Approximatel 7-8 times as much! Taking into account last year's figures and these calculations, we can safely say that on the Day of the Triumph of Orthodoxy in the Rivne diocese, about 35,000-40,000 believers took part in the religious processions!!!"

Earlier, the UOJ wrote about the celebration of the Day of the Triumph of Orthodoxy in the dioceses of the UOC, including large-scale religious processions in Kharkiv, Zaporozhia and Berdyansk. The cross procession of the UOC in Kyiv was postponed due to the pandemic, but, as the UOC Chancellor assured, it will definitely take place as soon as the situation allows.