Ukrainian Parishes Moved to OCU Amid Legal and Political Coercion

Photo: mospat.ru

KYIV — Between 2022 and 2025, approximately 1,378 religious communities of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (UOC) were "transferred" from their canonical allegiance to the state-backed Orthodox Church of Ukraine (OCU), according to Ukraine’s State Service for Ethnopolitics and Freedom of Conscience.

Data show 483 transfers in 2022, 471 in 2023, 233 in 2024, and 191 in 2025. The highest numbers were recorded in Kyiv (306), Khmelnytskyi (295), Vinnytsia (159), Zhytomyr (128), and Cherkasy (104) regions. No transfers were reported in Luhansk, Donetsk, or Zaporizhia.

Officials noted that the so-called transfers involve legal and property disputes, particularly in western Ukraine, and often occur without full community consent. Bp. Pimen said that there were only three voluntary transfers in the Rivne Eparchy.

The shifts follow legislative and legal measures, including the 2024 law restricting UOC activities and a 2025 lawsuit to terminate its operations in Ukraine, reflecting ongoing efforts to consolidate the OCU as the country’s primary Orthodox jurisdiction.

Previously, the UOJ reported on the OCU's forceful seizure of a canonical UOC church. 

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