Ukraine: More than 90 different religious denominations and movements
According to the State Service for Ethnopolitics and Freedom of Conscience, as of January 1 this year, there were 36,195 religious communities, 552 monasteries, and 201 spiritual educational institutions in Ukraine. The largest number of religious communities and monasteries is in the Lviv region. Source: Ukrinform
Most communities still belong to the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate - 29%, the Orthodox Church of Ukraine accounts for 22% of communities, and the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church ranks third with nearly 10% of communities. In terms of the number of monasteries, the Orthodox Church of Ukraine ranks fourth after the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate, which owns 39% of monasteries, the Roman Catholic Church (22% of monasteries), and the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church (20%).
According to a survey by the Razumkov Centre, by the end of 2023, only 5.6% of citizens identified themselves with the Moscow Patriarchate, while 42.2% considered themselves to be part of the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (over 55% supported the ban on the Russian Orthodox Church), 11% belonged to the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church, 1.2% to the Roman Catholic Church, and 13.4% to no religion (however, only 2.8% are convinced atheists).
The largest number of spiritual educational institutions (19%) belongs to the All-Ukrainian Union of Evangelical Christian-Baptists and the Orthodox Church of Ukraine (13%). Overall, in Ukraine, communities of over 90 diverse religious confessions and denominations are represented (Figure 2).
Figure 1. Number of religious communities, monasteries, and spiritual educational institutions by region as of January 1, 2024
Figure 2. Distribution of communities, monasteries, and spiritual educational institutions by denominations as of January 1, 2024
(Quelle: www.risu.ua, 24. Mai 2024)