Fr Vasily Balan about Kotiuzhany church: OCU will not receive our community

There are ongoing attempts to take over the UOC temple in the village of Kotiuzhany by schismatics. OCU "priest" Alexander Kazmirov at an illegal meeting of the community of St. Nicholas Church suddenly announced the transfer of parishioners from the canonical Church to the OCU. The dean of the Murovani Kurylivtsi Deanery of the Mohyliv-Podilskyi Eparchy, Archpriest Vasily Balan, in a video message posted on Facebook, notes that those who did not cross the threshold of the temple voted for the transition of the community from the canonical Church to the OCU. This "meeting" was held in the building of the House of Culture, and the parishioners of the community did not even attend it.

“How can a gathering of the community take place without the knowledge of the rector? What decisions could those people make when neither Father John, the rector of the church, nor his permanent parishioners were there and take any initiative? The OCU will not receive our community, we will do everything for this,” Father Vasily says.

According to him, the temple has belonged to the canonical Church and will continue to belong, despite the fact that the authorities and the police have sided with the OCU: they allow illegal meetings to be held, they provide “extras” during the seizure of churches.

“We came to this meeting – who did we see there? The residents of the village who have never crossed the threshold of the temple in these 20 years! These people cannot make a decision on the transfer of the community to the schismatic jurisdiction,” UOC believers say.

Earlier, the UOJ wrote about the prayer standing in Vinnytsia attended by Father Vasily Balan, dedicated to the observance of the religious rights, and that the invaders of the St. Nicholas Church in Kotiuzhany do not wear a pectoral cross and do not know the prayer “Our Father”.