Nightlong prayerful standing at Tithes Monastery due to threats of radicals

"Now there will be a Vigil. At night we will read the Psalm Book. It is cold outside, people are cold, tired, because they have been standing since 10am. There are elderly people; it's hard for them to do it. Nevertheless they stand and pray. The Akathist is being read uninterruptedly. In the temple, we can room up to 200 people. The rest are on the street. The clergy and believers from other eparchies are approaching to join us," father Gideon said at 5:00 pm on February 3.

According to the Abbot of the Desyatinny Monastery, after the danger posed by nationalists, including to the life and health of the brethren, as well as repeated attempts to set the temple on fire, he appealed for help to international organizations and to the Ukrainian authorities.

"We applied to the Security Service of Ukraine, the mayor of Kiev and the President of Ukraine. We appealed to all existing authorities, including international authorities. We also appealed to the United Nations, to the ambassadors of many states. We also made an address to the President of the United States of America Donald Trump with the request to protect the Tithes monastery – the center of Orthodoxy, where people come to pray in many countries, including US citizens. We ask to protect the right to freedom of religion," Archimandrite Gideon said.

On the morning of February 3, more than three thousand believers of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church came out to defend the shrine from the illegal seizure by the radicals on Starokievskaya Mountain.

Read also