Dumenko to an Athonite Abbot: We Are Freeing the Lavra from the Shackles of the "Russian World"
Responding to a guest from Athos, the head of the OCU declared that the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra is being "liberated" from the "false teaching of the Russian world" and is returning to "true service."
Following a "divine service" at the Dormition Cathedral of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, in which monks from the Athonite monastery of New Esphigmenou participated, Serhiy Dumenko told the Athonite delegation that the expulsion of the UOC from the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra constitutes the "liberation" of the monastery from the "shackles of the Russian world."
Reading from a prepared text, Dumenko emphasized that "this place is now being freed from these shackles of deception and is returning to true service to God, the Church, and the salvation of people." According to Dumenko, the venerable father Anthony "rejoices in spirit together with us" over his structure's establishment in the Lavra.
"He hears and sees your holy prayer, which sounds just as it did when this Ukrainian saint was among your brother-predecessors in the monastery of Esphigmenou," the head of the OCU stated.
Epiphaniy declared that "for a long time" the deception "held sway" over the Lavra as well. Dumenko thanked the brotherhood of Esphigmenou for their prayers "for the victory of truth" and for the "autocephalous church," and also recalled that in October of last year he had visited Athos with the blessing of Patriarch Bartholomew and had prayed first of all in that very monastery.
The head of the OCU added that he prays for those "opposing" his church to eventually "be reconciled" with it — a formulation that the UOC has traditionally interpreted as a call to join it.
Dumenko delivered his words about "liberation" in the cathedral from which the brotherhood of the canonical UOC had been expelled — the very place where monks had for decades been reviving monastic life after the Soviet-era desolation.
The Union of Orthodox Journalists previously reported that Athonite monks expressed protest over Dumenko's visit to the Holy Mountain.
