The Synod of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC) has decided to deprive the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) of half of the Kherson Diocese. These are parishes located on the left bank of the Dnipro River, temporarily occupied by Russia. They will now come under the control of the newly created so-called Skadovsk diocese, said Vladimir Legoyda, head of the Synodal Department for Church Relations with Society and the Media, moscowtimes.eu reports.
According to him, the decision to create a new structure was made "in connection with the actual impossibility" of Metropolitan John (Siopko) of Kherson and Tavria to manage the parishes and monastery located on the left bank of the Dnipro River, as well as in response to the appeal of the local clergy.
The new diocese with the cathedral center in Skadovsk will be established within the administrative boundaries of Oleshky, Holoprystan, Kalanchak, Skadovsk and Chaplynsk districts of the Kherson region. Bishop Aleksiy of Dzhankoy and Rozdilenka, who is subordinate to Crimean Metropolitan Tikhon (Shevkunov), has been entrusted with its management.
"In the event of a change in the external situation," the ROC reserves the right to consider the possible restoration of the Kherson diocese within its current borders.
A few months after the Russian invasion, on May 27, 2022, the UOC declared its independence from the Moscow Patriarchate. Then, the Russian Orthodox Church began to transfer church and administrative entities in the occupied territories of Ukraine to direct subordination to Patriarch Kirill. Thus, on June 7, 2022, the UOC lost control of the Dzhankoy, Simferopol, and Feodosia dioceses located in Crimea. They became part of the newly created Crimean Metropolis of the Russian Orthodox Church – in October 2023, it was headed by Metropolitan Tikhon, who is called the personal "confessor" of Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.