The Orthodox Church of Ukraine is preparing to canonize the wife of Prince Vladimir, Anna Porphyrogenita, and the wife of Prince Yaroslav, Ingegerd (Irina).
“We believe that once we do this, the war will come to an end,” — said Metropolitan Dmytriy Rudyuk, Doctor of Church History, Professor, and Head of the Institute of Church History during the international scientific conference “Orthodoxy in Ukraine,” dedicated to the 970th anniversary of the death of Prince Yaroslav the Wise.
The forum took place at the National Preserve “Saint Sophia of Kyiv,” as reported by the Ministry of Culture and Information Policy of Ukraine.
The event brought together leading scholars, representatives of the church and government bodies, who discussed pressing issues regarding the preservation of Ukrainian spiritual heritage and the impact of the era of Yaroslav the Wise on the formation of our statehood.
“Today, more than ever, it is important to emphasize historical truth, as the enemy is attempting not only to appropriate our territories but also to rewrite our history by manipulating the events that shaped Ukrainian identity. We now have a clear understanding that the baptism of Kyivan Rus took place here, in Kyiv, on the waters of the Pochayna River, in the area of modern-day Postal Square. This is the place where we made our choice of the European path through the adoption of Christianity. We continue to pave the way for the restoration of historical justice and the choice of conveying this truth, despite the latest clumsy attempts to undermine our European identity by trying to claim Christianity for the swamps,” — noted the Minister of Culture and Information Policy of Ukraine, Mykola Tochitsky, in his welcoming address.
During the conference, it was also mentioned that Prince Yaroslav the Wise himself suffered from the actions of the enemy, as his remains were secretly transported from Kyiv in 1943, even though scholars were convinced that they were in a sarcophagus in Saint Sophia of Kyiv. Instead, they turned out to be not male remains but rather female ones, likely those of Prince Ingegerd's (Irina) wife. Nelya Kukovalska, the General Director of the National Preserve “Saint Sophia of Kyiv,” stated that additional DNA research will be conducted soon to clarify this fact.