St. Alexander Nevsky's Convent

The convent in honour of Saint Right-believing Prince Alexander Nevsky stands in the village of Cherniyivka in the Polonskyi district of the Khmelnytskyi region¹.

According to the accounts of local inhabitants, set down in a local-history description of the house of 2013, the site of the future monastery was an ordinary patch of waste ground, and people passing over it more than once heard church singing coming from there⁴.

The first, temporary church on this site was built in 1996 by the parishioners of the neighbouring village of Kutiuzhentsi and of the settlement of Pervomaisk^{3, 4}. The building work was carried out on the offerings of parishioners and of the faithful⁴.

In 1997 the first stone was laid for a new church in the name of Saint Right-believing Prince Alexander Nevsky^{3, 4}.

From 1998 a second church was built at the house together with a residential block. A two-storey building arose: on the ground floor - the cells of the sisters, on the upper floor - the church of the Holy Royal Passion-bearers, consecrated in 2002; all the work was completed at the end of 2003^{3, 4}.

On 9 March 2004 the Holy Synod of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, having heard the report of Archbishop Antonii of Khmelnytskyi and Shepetivka, by journal No. 7 blessed the opening of a convent in honour of Saint Right-believing Prince Alexander Nevsky in the village of Cherniyivka in the Polonskyi district of the Khmelnytskyi region¹.

In that same year of 2004 a bell tower was raised at the house³. According to the local-history description, it was a structure that joined a well to a bell tower; at the same time a kitchen with a monastery refectory appeared, and gas was brought to the house⁴.

On 12 September 2005 the principal church of the house, in the name of Saint Right-believing Prince Alexander Nevsky, was adorned and consecrated^{3, 4}.

In the autumn of the same year the first stone was laid at the house for a residence for the clergy⁴.

On 31 May 2007 the Holy Synod, by journal No. 59, divided the Khmelnytskyi eparchy: it formed the Shepetivka eparchy, assigned to it the city of Netishyn and six districts of the Khmelnytskyi region, among them the Polonskyi one, and ruled that its ruling bishop should bear the title of Shepetivka and Slavuta². Since then the house has belonged to the Shepetivka eparchy^{2, 5}.

As of 2013, when the local-history description was compiled, the grounds of the monastery covered five hectares; a young birch grove was growing around the house, and on the monastery's land there was a lake in which the sisters raised fish⁴.

On 12 September 2016, on the feast of the translation of the relics of Saint Right-believing Prince Alexander Nevsky, Bishop Yevsevii of Shepetivka and Slavuta led the Divine Liturgy in the monastery, after which a festal cross procession took place⁵.