Holy Spirit Monastery

The Holy Spirit Monastery for men of the Dnipropetrovsk eparchy stands in the village of Krasnopillia, which lies within the bounds of the city of Dnipro². The services in the house are celebrated in Church Slavonic²; the monastery has a site of its own^{2, 3}.

Before the house came into being, a wooden church in honour of St Sergius of Radonezh was being built in Krasnopillia. On 18 July 2017, the day of the finding of the relics of St Sergius, hegumen of Radonezh, the ruling bishop of the Dnipropetrovsk eparchy, metropolitan Irynei of Dnipropetrovsk and Pavlohrad, celebrated in that unfinished church the first Liturgy by hierarchical rite⁵. Before the service began the children of the Sunday parish school greeted him⁵. At the augmented litany special petitions were offered for the welfare of our land and the healing of the sick, and the hierarch read a prayer for peace in Ukraine⁵.

After the Liturgy a procession went round the church under construction, at the end of which metropolitan Irynei read a prayer to St Sergius of Radonezh, and a proclamation of many years was made for all who bear the saint's honoured name⁵. On the same day the builder of the church, Serhii Fedorovych Shvachko, was awarded the order of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Baptism of Kyivan Rus, and the benefactors of the parish received letters of hierarchical blessing⁵.

On 21 December 2017 the Holy Synod of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, presided over by His Beatitude Metropolitan Onufrii of Kyiv and All Ukraine, considered the report of metropolitan Irynei of Dnipropetrovsk and Pavlohrad on the establishment of the Holy Spirit Monastery for men, and blessed the establishment of the house and the acceptance and registration of its Statute¹. This is Journal No. 37 of that session, and the eparchy itself afterwards confirmed both the date and the number of the journal⁴.

The wooden church of St Sergius of Radonezh in which the service was held in the summer of 2017, and the church which five months later stood within the bounds of the new house, are one and the same building: one dedication, the same material, the same village, the same unfinished state. On 12 February 2018 metropolitan Irynei visited the monastery and performed the rite of the consecration of the Cross to be raised on the dome of that church⁴. He congratulated those present on the notable event and wished them God's help in the speedy completion of the building⁴.