Publicist: Avrahamiy Lotysh – Lavra Reserve employee

Ministry of Culture employee Avrahamiy Lotysh at his workplace. Photo: Reserve's Facebook page

Religious publicist Tetiana Derkach, who advocates for the interests of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU) in the media, stated that the "abbot of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra of the OCU", Avrahamiy Lotysh, is an employee of the Reserve.

Commenting on the situation surrounding the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra and the relationship between religious denominations and the state, Derkach claimed that "the weakest position belongs to the OCU, which is generally considered the initiator of the severance of relations between the Reserve and the UOC."

According to her, the OCU has "moral truth on its side, as the national church has the priority right to use the national shrine."

"But the head of the Kyiv-Pechersk Monastery community of the OCU, Bishop Avrahamiy, is simultaneously an employee of the museum, which leaves him with little room for maneuver," Derkach asserts.

She writes that "the current status quo clearly does not satisfy the OCU, but the Reserve does not seem ready to offer anything more."

"Nevertheless, by default, the OCU will always bear part of the reputational responsibility for the actions of the Reserve," she claims. According to the publicist, the OCU does not have the same resources for activities in the Lavra as the UOC once had, and it "only receives permission to serve within these walls from time to time." As a result, the real beneficiaries of the entire situation surrounding the Lavra, according to Derkach, "turned out to be officials and politicians who are truly far from religion," who simply "took control of a valuable asset."

Earlier, the UOJ reported that Lotysh compared himself to Mazepa despite the fact that people consider him a traitor.

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