Parishioners of UOC сhurch in Kamen-Kashirsky "fail" transfer to OCU

The Church of the Nativity of the Most Holy Theotokos in the town of Kamen-Kashirsky of the Volyn region

On March 24, 2019, a parish meeting of a religious community was held in the Church of the Nativity of the Most Holy Theotokos of the UOC of the Volyn town of Kamen-Kashirsky, whose members confirmed their decision to remain under the jurisdiction of the canonical Ukrainian Orthodox Church. While the church was full of believers, OCU adherents managed to gather a small group of up to 50 people to hold on the territory of the church the so-called “secret vote” for the transfer to the OCU.

"Among our supporters was the mother of one of the initiators of the "transfer”. She went to her son and asked why he was doing that, but he himself sees how many people disagree with him,” said Archpriest Yuri Mikhailov, the rector of the church, in his commentary to the UOJ.

We recall that the action group, including the deputy mayor, had announced a week earlier that it would hold “a vote by registration” in order to transfer the parish to the OCU. The initiators of the transfer collected signatures among the residents of certain streets. However, as the parishioners of the church found out, only 319 people signed up for this idea, including those who do not reside in the selected area. At the same time, signatures were collected in the church to leave the parish alone and not to change its jurisdiction; more than 1,250 signatures for this decision were recorded in the minutes of the meeting.

In order to prevent possible manipulations with the data collected by OCU activists, the community sent copies of the true protocol of the parish meeting with signatures in their support to the mass media, law enforcement bodies, and regional state administration officials.

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