Monks of OCU in Lavra are reserve employees, ex-cleric

The Upper Lavra. Photo: OCU

Former cleric of the OCU Yaroslav Yasenets stated that the monks of Epifaniy Dumenko's structure in the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra are officially employed at the state reserve and receive salaries there.

He shared this in an interview with the UOJ in America. The interview was conducted by the editor-in-chief of the publication, Ben Dixon.

"I don't know if all of them signed the contract in order to live there but I know that most of them are officially employees of the museum and they are doing some kind of work there to receive a salary and have some money for their need," said the former cleric.

He reported that there are currently only six OCU monks in the Lavra. However, one of them recently left, stating that there is no real monastic life there.

"He is a good friend of mine, I've known him for a long time. He said that there is no true monastic life there and he doesn't want to participate in it," noted the ex-cleric of the OCU.

Yasenets emphasized that under the UOC, about 150 monks live in the Lavra. Previously, around eight liturgies were served on Sundays in different churches of the monastery, and all of them were full of people. Now, when the OCU serves in the churches of the Upper Lavra, there are almost no parishioners.

"When they are making pictures of their services, most times they're taking pictures only of those who are celebrating and not of the people. And sometimes if you see independent pictures, you see that the number of people who attend the services is very small," added the ex-cleric.

He is convinced that the situation for the OCU could be improved and parishioners attracted, but Dumenko is not particularly interested in this.

"This also can be fixed. There are ways to draw people to come to Lavra to the services, but you have to work on that. And in the church of Epiphaniy they think that if we received the Thomas and now are favored by the state, everything will come by itself. It won't, you have to to do something, you have to gain it," believes Yasenets.

Earlier, the UOJ wrote that, according to TSN journalists, only Ministry of Culture employees can be monks in the Lavra.

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