Bakaevka, Cherkasy Province, Ukraine, March 27, 2020
Photo: news.church.ua
In the midst of their Lenten ascetic struggles, 9 nuns have dedicated themselves entirely to Christ in the Holy Protection-Krasnogorsk Convent in the Cherkasy Diocese of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.
Yesterday, March 26, His Eminence Metropolitan Sophrony of Cherkasy and Kaniv, tonsured the nuns into the Great Schema, the highest degree of Orthodox monasticism, reports the Information-Education Department of the UOC.
During the tonsuring to the Great Schema, the celebrating bishop or priest instructs:
If therefore you truly seek to follow him, and if without lies you ardently desire to be called his disciple, from the present moment prepare yourself not towards ease, not towards freedom from care, not towards sensual pleasures, not towards anything else of those pleasures and enjoyments which are on the earth, but towards spiritual struggles, towards temperance of the flesh, towards purification of the soul, towards mean poverty, towards the good grief, towards all the sorrowful and painful things of that life according to God which brings joy.
Several other tonsures took place in other Ukrainian monasteries in recent days.
Photo: otrada.net
On Tuesday, March 24, at the Convent of the Mother of God “Joy and Consolation” in the village of Bolshaya Olshanka in the Kiev Province, His Eminence Archbishop Jonah of Obukhov tonsured four novices into monasticism, who received the names Agnia, Gregory, Amphilochia, and Ilaria.
“Yesterday we had a big holiday in the monastery: the birth of four nuns at once!... The tonsure is the indescribable bright joy of starting a new life, a special closeness to God. We congratulate our dear sisters and wish them strength from the Lord and the help of the Most Holy mother of God!” reads the monastery’s report.
Photo: eparhia.vinnica.ua
On Wednesday, March 25, His Eminence Metropolitan Barsanuphius of Vinnitsa celebrated the tonsure of several sisters in the Holy Trinity-Brailov Convent.
His Eminence wished the newly-tonsured nuns to continue working in Christ’s field and to be faithful to God until their last breath.
OrthoChristian previously reported that His Beatitude Metropolitan Onuphry of Kiev and All Ukraine tonsured four monks at the Kiev Caves Lavra on March 5.
