Christmas Celebrated In Ukrainian For First Time In The Country's Main Church

On the second day of Orthodox Christmas, January 7, Mass was celebrated in the Dormition Cathedral in central Kyiv, part of the UNESCO-listed Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra complex, which was retaken from the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate, for the first time in over 300 years. It became possible after the Ukrainian government terminated the Moscow-linked church’s lease at the end of 2022, returning the properties to direct state control following suspicions that the Moscow-linked church had been acting as an agent during the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine.