Qualla: Holy Trinity Orthodox Cathedral, Lutsk

Holy Trinity Orthodox Cathedral, Lutsk: Introduction

Sat, 25 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit CC BY 2.5. It was designed by a Polish Jesuit architect for a Bernardine monastery, funded by a Radziwiłł, and built in the Baroque style of the late 18th century. Then the Russian Empire arrived. By 1853 the monks were gone, and by the 1870s the Russian government had bolted on a central dome and a bell tower in the heavy pseudo-Russian style of the late Tsarist era - reshaping a Catholic church into something visibly Orthodox without quite hiding what was underneath. The Holy Trinity Cathedral on Theatre Square in Lutsk is what such transformations look like in stone: a Jesuit floor plan dressed in Russian Orthodox masonry, holding services today for the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and the city's Volyn faithful.

Image: CC BY 2.5

Holy Trinity Orthodox Cathedral, Lutsk: The Bernardine Foundation

Sat, 25 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Lestat (Jan Mehlich), CC BY-SA 3.0. There has been a church on this hill near Lutsk since at least the 15th century. In the 1640s King Władysław IV Vasa donated the church to the Bernardines - a reformed Franciscan order that had been spreading through the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth for two centuries. The Berna...

Image: Lestat (Jan Mehlich) | CC BY-SA 3.0

Holy Trinity Orthodox Cathedral, Lutsk: Built With Radziwiłł Money

Sat, 25 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit котис олександр, CC BY 3.0. After the fire, a member of the Radziwiłł family - one of the wealthiest noble dynasties in the Commonwealth - granted 40,000 złoty to rebuild the monastery in brick. Another 16,000 złoty went to construct dungeons. The architect chosen for the new church was Paweł Giżycki, a Pol...

Image: котис олександр | CC BY 3.0

Holy Trinity Orthodox Cathedral, Lutsk: The Russians Move In

Sat, 25 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Котис Олександр (kotykS), CC BY 3.0. In 1793, with the Second Partition of Poland, Russian troops seized the complex and used it as a military warehouse until 1800. In the early 19th century part of the monastery served as the residence of Bishop Kasper Kazimierz Cieciszowski. Volyn had retained its old Polish-Lithu...

Image: Котис Олександр (kotykS) | CC BY 3.0

Holy Trinity Orthodox Cathedral, Lutsk: A Dome Bolted On

Sat, 25 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit kotykS, CC BY 3.0. In 1876 the architect K. Rastruhanov was sent to Russify the building. He demolished the gallery that had connected the church to the monastery, removed the elements that read most strongly as Catholic Baroque, and added a central dome and a bell tower above the narthex. Both wer...

Image: kotykS | CC BY 3.0

Holy Trinity Orthodox Cathedral, Lutsk: Polish, Soviet, Ukrainian

Sat, 25 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Bandanschik, CC BY-SA 3.0. Volyn became part of the Second Polish Republic from 1920 to 1939, with Lutsk serving as the administrative center of Volyn Voivodeship. The voivodeship offices were located in the former Bernardine monastery beside the church. After the Soviet annexation of western Ukraine in 19...

Image: Bandanschik | CC BY-SA 3.0