Department for External Church Relations
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In Ukraine the priest of a captured church is sought to be deprived of his home that has become the place for parochial worship services
At the village of Sadov, Volyn region, representatives of the ‘OCU’, who captured the parish church of Our Lady of Kazan in February 2019, continue terrorizing the rector of the parish and members of the community who have remained faithful of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church.
They are being threatened; the windows of the house were crashed; Father Vladimir’s underage son was beat. Last September 4, young radical men came to his house; they demonstrated grenades promising to use them against the priest and his family if they do not agree in an amicable way to vacate the church house in which his family resides reasonably. As they themselves said, they were asked by supporters of the ‘OCU’ to drive the priest away from his home.
In the end of May 2020, it became known that the Starostinsky district officials together with other officials in an abuse of their powers registered their ownership of the church house in which Archpriest Vladimir Meles and his family are officially registered and live. The house technical passport was issued while a private notary of the Lutsk municipal notary, Ms. Natalia Kurta registered the ownership of the facility without proper documents and with a violation of the law in force.
Ultimately, on May 20, the priest appealed to law enforcement bodies to press a criminal case but because of the inaction of the investigator who upon receiving the application failed to register it as a pre-trial investigation, the priest had to appeal to court.
On May 28, the Lutsk district court in the Volyn region obliged the law enforcement officers to register the information about the unlawful registration of ownership of the church house at the Sadov village, in which the priest resides together with his underage children.
DECR Communication Service
With reference to websites of the Information-Education Department
of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church
and the Diocese of Volyn
Patriarch
Sermons
24.01.2021
06.11.2020