KCSA: Drabinko’s Cathedral in Kyiv moves to OCU only now

The Transfiguration Cathedral in Kyiv, Teremky district. Photo: pereyaslav-eparchia.kiev.ua

The Transfiguration Cathedral in Kyiv’s Teremky district, headed by OCU hierarch and former UOC Metropolitan Oleksandr Drabinko, has officially joined Dumenko’s structure. This was reported to “Vechirniy Kyiv” by Kyiv City Council deputy Viktoria Mukha on May 7, 2025.

According to her, the Transfiguration Cathedral community and the UOC parish of St. Martyr Paraskeva “made the decision to change their canonical affiliation and join the Orthodox Church of Ukraine.”

“Following another massive attack on Kyiv, the capital received news that inspires and strengthens faith: two more religious communities have decided to change their canonical affiliation and join the Orthodox Church of Ukraine. Both communities, at a general assembly, voted by majority to leave the jurisdiction of the Moscow Patriarchate. The corresponding amendments to their statutes have already been officially registered,” Mukha stated.

It is noted that the first of the communities does not yet have its own church building. It is registered on Dniprovska Embankment, among new residential buildings and gas stations. However, according to available information, the Transfiguration parish does have a fully functioning church in the Teremky-II district, and “the OCU has already been conducting services in this church for some time”.

It is believed that this is not about an actual recent change in religious affiliation but rather the formal legal registration of a transition that took place earlier. Archbishop Oleksandr Drabinko, who has been ministering at this church for many years, publicly joined the newly established OCU back in 2018.

As previously reported by the UOJ, the religious communities of the Ascension and Holy Spirit Churches in the Bukovynian village of Banyliv-Pidhirny remain faithful to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. According to the website of UOC believers in the Chernivtsi-Bukovyna Eparchy, media claims about these parishes’ "transfer" to the OCU are fake.

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