Lutsk Brotherhood of the Elevation of the Cross

Lutsk Brotherhood of the Elevation of the Cross (Луцьке Хрестово-Воздвиженське братство; Lutske Khresto-Vozdvyzhenske bratstvo). A renowned Orthodox brotherhood founded in 1617 in Lutsk by Herasym Mykulych, the hegumen of the Chernchytsi Monastery located near the city. The Lutsk Brotherhood included monks, priests, bishops, nobles, aristocrats, and members of the middle class from Lutsk and Volhynia. It received a charter from the Polish king Sigismund III Vasa in 1619 and was granted the status of stauropegion by the Patriarch of Constantinople in 1623. It ran the Lutsk Brotherhood of the Elevation of the Cross School and operated a printing press in the monastery. After Bohdan Khmelnytsky’s era the brotherhood entered a period of steady decline. It was revived in 1896 by the Russian government with the intention that its activities ‘strengthen the Russian people.’ From 1920 the brotherhood functioned without a charter. In 1931 it was liquidated by the Polish government, only to be granted a new charter in 1935 which recognized the brotherhood's 17th-century roots but not the right to its holdings (they were left under government jurisdiction). The activities of the brotherhood ceased with the Soviet occupation of Lutsk.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Biriulina, O. et al (eds). Pom’ianyk: Volyns’ke kraiove Bratstvo sviatoho apostola Andriia Pervozvannoho (Luts’ke khrestovozdvyzhenske): Vid roku Bozhoho 1618 dali (Lutsk 2000)
Kraliuk, P. Luts’ke khrestovozdvyzhdens’ke bratstvo (Lutsk 1996)

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 3 (1993).]