Kremenets, Ternopil Province, Ukraine, November 8, 2024
Photo: uoc-news.church
Eight hierarchs and a host of clergy, monastics, and faithful came together at the Holy Theophany Convent in Kremenets in Western Ukraine on Wednesday, November 6 to celebrate the feast of the Joy of All Who Sorrow icon of the Most Holy Theotokos.
The Divine Liturgy for the feast was led by the local hierarch His Eminence Metropolitan Sergei of Ternopil, together with another seven UOC hierarchs, including His Eminence Metropolitan Vladimir, abbot of the Holy Dormition-Pochaev Lavra, reports the Khmelnitsky Diocese.
Special prayers were offered for peace in Ukraine and for the persecuted Ukrainian Orthodox Church.
Photo: uoc-news.church
At the end of the service, a cross procession was held around the monastery with its revered “Sorrowful” Icon of the Mother of God, after which Met. Sergei addressed the faithful with a sermon. He thanked the hierarchs, clergy, abbesses, and faithful for their joint prayer, and congratulated everyone on the feast of the Joy of All Who Sorrow icon.
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The Holy Theophany Monastery in Kremenets was founded as a male monastery in the first half of the 17th century. In 1725, it was taken over by Uniate Greek Catholics and did not return to Orthodoxy until 1839. In 1953, the monastery was transformed into a convent, and by 1959, there were 67 sisters living there. On July 29-30, 1959, the monastery was closed and the church was used as a gym, while the monastic residential building housed a hospital.
The rebirth of the monastery began on August 26, 1990, when the Sorrowful Icon of the Mother of God, kept in the monastery before the revolution and moved to the Pochaev Lavra after its closing, was carried in procession back to its former place. Nuns returned to the monastery in 1991.
The monastery was 
Authorities now targeting nuns in Western Ukrainian conventVideo published by the UOC showed several dozen police officers and several police vehicles outside the monastery.
“>targeted last year by Ukrainian officials who tried to evict the nuns.
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