St. Panteleimon's Convent

In the village of Khizhnyi, in the Zhashkiv district of the Cherkasy region, stands St. Panteleimon's Convent of the Uman Diocese of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church^{1, 2}. The village lies on the right bank of the Hirskyi Tikych, 28 kilometres south-east of Zhashkiv³.

By the diocese's own account, the house grew out of a parish: in 2001, with the blessing of the ruling bishop, a church in honour of the Holy Apostle and Evangelist Luke was founded at Khizhnyi, and the convent was opened on the basis of that very parish². In the list of the parishes of the Zhashkiv deanery that the diocese published in 2016, the church of the Apostle Luke at Khizhnyi is still entered as a separate parish, served by a priest who concurrently held another charge⁴.

The Uman Diocese to which the house belongs was formed by the Holy Synod of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church on 8 May 2008, by journal No. 43: it separated the diocese from the Cherkasy Diocese and assigned to it eight districts of the Cherkasy region, among them Zhashkiv, in which Khizhnyi lies; its ruling bishops were given the title "of Uman and Zvenyhorodka"⁵.

The opening of the house was blessed by the Holy Synod at its session of 14 June 2011, by journal No. 38, on the report of Bishop Panteleimon of Uman and Zvenyhorodka⁶.

That act names the site of the house not Khizhnyi but the village of Odai⁶, and the diocese's own page names it the same way⁷. Odai is a hamlet three kilometres from Khizhnyi, formed in 1923-1924 and belonging to the Khizhnyi village council³.

On 1 July 2011 Bishop Panteleimon came to the Zhashkiv deanery to see the state of affairs at the monastery: he met its superior, discussed the building of the church and the further development of the house, and blessed the laying of the foundation⁸.

On 9 August 2011 the house kept its patronal feast, to which clergy and parishioners from every deanery of the diocese travelled. For that day a temporary tent church and tents for the meal were put up at the monastery; the bishop presented an icon to the house, and the celebration ended with a monastic meal⁹.

The monastery's own site writes that for the first arranging of the house several bought village houses were used as cells, and a fitted-out wagon served as the church premises¹⁰.

On 31 August 2012 Archbishop Panteleimon of Uman and Zvenyhorodka led the Divine Liturgy at the monastery; the deans of the diocese's districts and clergy from every deanery concelebrated with him, and numerous pilgrims prayed before a copy of the "Vsetsarytsia" icon of the Mother of God brought from Mount Athos^{7, 11}.

On 27 October 2015 the Holy Synod, by journal No. 45, blessed the acceptance and registration of the monastery's Statute; in that act the settlement is already called the village of Khizhnyi¹.

The house is dedicated to the Holy Great Martyr and Healer Panteleimon, and it is his memory that it keeps as its patronal feast^{12, 9}.

On the page that the diocese published in 2015 it is stated that three nuns, one rassophore nun and one novice bore obedience at the house⁷.