TRC representatives detain Pochaiv Lavra hierodeacon
Hierodeacon Olympiy (Khrashchevsky). Photo: UOJ
On May 15, at the Ukrainian border while entering from Georgia, representatives of the Territorial Recruitment Center (TRC) detained Hierodeacon Olympiy (Khrashchevsky).
According to UOJ sources, the 45-year-old cleric, who has health problems, is currently being held at the TRC in the town of Kelmentsi.
Father Olympiy is a tonsured monk of the Holy Dormition Pochaiv Lavra. He spent the last six years in the mountains of Abkhazia, pursuing the ascetic life of a desert-dweller.
The hierodeacon intended to return to his monastery – the Holy Spirit Skete in Pochaiv – to continue his monastic service, but on his way to the shrine he was detained.
As previously reported by the UOJ, the TRC detained an archimandrite of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra in Kyiv. While monastics devote their lives to prayer, their spiritual status is ignored during mobilization.
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