Saint Volodymyr's Cathedral

St Volodymyr's Cathedral (Ukrainian: Володимирський собор) is a cathedral in the centre of Kyiv. It serves as the mother cathedral of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church – Kyiv Patriarchate.

Its ownership is debated between the Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Kyiv Patriarchate and the Ukrainian Orthodox Church (Moscow Patriarchate), two major Eastern Orthodox churches in Ukraine (see History of Christianity in Ukraine).

History and description

Interior view of the cathedral Saint Volodymyr, Kyiv, Department of Image Collections, National Gallery of Art Library, Washington, DC

The entrance door is adorned with relief bronze sculptures of St. Olga (Princess Olga of Kyiv) by sculptor Robert Bakh and St. Vladimir (sculptor H. Zaieman) against a blue background. The iconostasis is carved from the white marble brought from Carrara. The cathedral was completed in 1882, however, the paintings were fully completed only in 1896.

St. Volodymyr's Cathedral converted to an anti-religious museum in the early 1920s

During the Soviet period, the cathedral narrowly escaped demolition, but not closure. Until the Second World War it served as a museum of religion and atheism. The relics of Saint Barbara, a martyr of the 3rd century, were transferred to St. Volodymyr's from the St. Michael's Golden-Domed Monastery before it was destroyed by the Bolsheviks, and have remained there since.

Since the end of World War II and up until 1990 the cathedral was the mother church of the Ukrainian Exarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC). In 1990, when the Kiev Metropolitan's see of ROC was restyled as the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, formally fully autonomous but remaining under the Patriarch of Moscow, the St. Volodymyr's remained the Mother Cathedral of the newly established Ukrainian Church.

Upon the arrival of a new canonical leader of Ukrainian Orthodox Church, Metropolitan Volodymyr (Viktor Sabodan), elected at the Kharkiv sinod, where Filaret was ousted from his position as head of that church, Volodymyr and several thousand believers who gathered to meet him, encountered a heavily guarded cathedral surrounded by riot police and UNA - UNSO paramilitary members which barricaded themselves in the church.

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