After the full-scale invasion of Ukraine by the Russian Federation, more than 700 parishes joined the Orthodox Church of Ukraine.
This was emphasized by the head of the OCU, Metropolitan Epifaniy, in an interview with LB.ua.
According to the bishop, over the past four years, almost 1,500 religious communities have joined the OCU.
“As for the number of religious communities that are now part of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine, there are about 8,000 parishes. After the full-scale invasion, more than 700 parishes joined the Orthodox Church of Ukraine. That is, in general, if we take the last four years of the independence of the local OCU, after the Unification Cathedral, about 1,500 religious communities joined our community, hhaving dropped the Moscow Patriarchate. It’s not just religious communities, but full-fledged churches, i.e. communities that own churches and property,” Epifaniy noted.
At the same time, the bishop noted that the number of parishes in the occupied territories amounts to about 2,500. Over time, they will be even fewer.
“If you count the parishes in the occupied territories, it is about 2,500. If they are subtracted from the total number that was not advertised, because in reality they never had 12,000 parishes. Perhaps there were registered ones, but if we remember how religious communities were registered back in the days of Kuchma’s presidency, then there was an order from the authorities to register a religious community in almost every settlement. I saw how it was done in the Rivne region – they simply submitted data, and communities were registered in the administration, so they only existed on paper. Therefore, now, perhaps, they have even fewer than the Orthodox Church of Ukraine currently has. Gradually, the Russian Orthodox Church in Ukraine will shrink, so the communities that will make decisions to join the Orthodox Church of Ukraine will expand the OCU,” the head of the OCU emphasized.
