The City Court of Noginsk (Moscow region) has decided to demolish the Orthodox Holy Trinity Church, which is part of Bogorodsk Diocese of the Kyiv Patriarchate. The temple in Nogonsk was the only church in Russia within the jurisdiction of the UOC-KP.
The City Court of Noginsk (Moscow region) has decided to demolish the Orthodox Holy Trinity Church, which is part of Bogorodsk Diocese of the Kyiv Patriarchate. The temple in Nogonsk was the only church in Russia within the jurisdiction of the UOC-KP. It existed from the beginning of the 90s, and in the year 1994 its abbot Metropolitan Adrian, being an ethnic Ukrainian, joined the UOC-KP. As parishioners explained to "New Region", their church was always persecuted by the Moscow Patriarchate, but only at the beginning of the Russo-Ukrainian war it became full-scale. “Before the war, for example, the posters were placed around the city saying that we are a schismatic church devoid of grace, we even were refused to buy coffins with funeral sets if the service for the deceased was held here. From the beginning of the Russian aggression, a fundamental persecution started, “a cleansing,” the believers report. The “cleansing" was carried out in all areas. The church was denounced on television, on radio and in local newspapers daily. Posters placed around the city have also become tougher. They called the UOC-KP a "false church" and told that its priests “do not consider it a sin to kill those who live in Donbas and Moscow” and “welcome the junta’s military operations in the southeast of the country.” The culmination of persecution was filing a lawsuit on behalf of the administration of Noginsk district five months ago. But the parishioners believe - it was at the instigation of the Moscow Patriarchate that the proceedings were instituted. “We were accused that we had built uninhabited building on this land - namely the church, the priest of the Holy Trinity Church Svyatoslav Skorokhod said. “The land plot was quite legally privatized by us long time ago, so we have a right to build any houses there. The church had engineering and architectural design documentation, all technical documentation. But this is a purely political issue,” Fr Sviatoslav is sure.
Now the clergy of the church intends to appeal the decision at the court of appeal. By the way, this is not the first such case in Russia. Thus, in 2015, in the village of Pobeda, Penza region, a church and bell tower that belonged to the Kyiv Patriarchate were demolished on a court order.