St. Elizabeth the New-Martyr's Convent

The Convent of the Hieromartyr Grand Duchess Elizabeth is a women's monastery of the Boryspil Diocese of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, in the village of Zazymya, Brovary District, Kyiv Region¹.

By the community's own account, monastic life on this land is of long standing: a skete and a winter farmstead of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra, and later of the Kyiv-Sophia monastery, once stood here^{2, 4}.

The present community began at the end of 2014, when the first six sisters of the future convent settled in a building fitted out on the bank of the Desna; services and water-blessing molebens began in a temporary church^{2, 4}.

On 29 January 2015 His Beatitude Metropolitan Onufriy of Kyiv and All Ukraine consecrated the site for the building of a church in honour of the Hieromartyr Elizabeth. At that time the community was a skete of the stauropegial women's monastery of the Athos Icon of the Mother of God⁴.

On 18 July 2017, with the blessing of Metropolitan Onufriy, the completed church in honour of the Hieromartyr Grand Duchess Elizabeth was consecrated by Bishop Clement of Irpin, vicar of the Kyiv Metropolia^{2, 3}. Since then the Divine Liturgy has been celebrated in it every Sunday².

On 21 December 2017 the Holy Synod of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, having considered the report of Metropolitan Antonii of Boryspil and Brovary, by Journal No. 36 blessed the formation of the women's monastery in honour of the Hieromartyr Grand Duchess Elizabeth of the Boryspil Diocese and the acceptance and registration of its statute^{1, 3}. On the same day the Synod formed three further houses - two women's and one men's - in the Dnipropetrovsk, Horlivka and Chernivtsi-Bukovyna dioceses⁵.

The memory of the Hieromartyr Mykhailo Podielskyi, presbyter of Zazymya, is bound up with the village. Born in Nizhyn in 1878, he was ordained priest in 1925, was first detained in 1930, and after his release was forced to move to Zazymya, where, despite pressure from the authorities, he refused to close the church⁶.

On 19 November 1937 Father Mykhailo was arrested on a charge of "anti-Soviet agitation", and on 27 November of the same year he was shot. On 23 November 2021 Metropolitan Onufriy led the service in Boryspil at which he was glorified among the saints⁶.

On 26 November 2023 the Divine Liturgy was celebrated at the convent by His Beatitude Metropolitan Onufriy, with Metropolitan Antonii of Boryspil and Brovary concelebrating. On that day the memory of the Hieromartyr Mykhailo was also honoured at the monastery, and the service ended with the rite of glorification to the saints⁷.