Sister Tetyana, who loves animals, picking up one of the neighbours’ dogs along with some of the children, Vitaliy Mykhalo (centre) and Ivan Mykhalo staying at the monastery. The nuns aren’t allowed to keep pets, so she visits the neighbours and their three dogs, in Hoshiv, Ukraine. Photos: TNS/Los Angeles Times/Carolyn Cole
In high, tremulous voices, the Sisters of the Holy Family were chanting their midday prayers when a child’s gleeful shout echoed from a nearby corridor, punctuating the solemn incantation. The Ukrainian nuns didn’t miss a beat.
At this quiet monastery in the green foothills of the Carpathian mountains, the timeless rhythms of spiritual life have been altered in ways large and small by the presence of dozens of war-displaced mothers and children, many of whom arrive terrified and traumatised by bombardment and fighting.
