DESS reports number of UOC “transfers” to OCU since start of war

OCU supporters "peacefully" enter St. Michael's Cathedral of the UOC in Cherkasy. Photo: UOJ

Since 2022 through early March 2026, a total of 1,387 religious communities of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church have “transferred” to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine. This was reported to the Glavcom outlet by Viktor Voinalovych, First Deputy Head of the State Service of Ukraine for Ethnopolitics and Freedom of Conscience (DESS).

At the same time, DESS data indicate a rapid slowdown in the process. In Khmelnytskyi region, the leader in the number of “transfers,” 246 communities changed jurisdiction in 2022–2023, compared to just 37 in 2024 and 12 in 2025. A similar trend is seen in Kyiv region: 228 communities transferred in 2022–2023, while only 78 did so over 2024–2025 combined.

In Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Ivano-Frankivsk, Luhansk, Lviv, Mykolaiv, Ternopil, and Kherson regions, not a single “transfer” was recorded last year.

Positive dynamics were observed only in Chernivtsi and Chernihiv regions. In Bukovyna, 38 communities joined the OCU in 2025, compared to 7 in 2024.

According to regional military administrations, as of early 2025 the UOC remains the largest Orthodox denomination in the country, with 10,118 entities: 9,792 religious communities, 210 monasteries, 34 brotherhoods, 17 missions, and 16 theological schools. At the same time, the OCU network included 8,511 entities, of which 8,291 were communities and 91 monasteries.

Earlier, UOC Chancellor Metropolitan Antoniy stated that “voluntary transfers” of parishes to the OCU are “a falsehood.”

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