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During World War II, the Orthodox and Ukrainians were not being persecuted due to the war (Ukraine was a battleground between the German and Soviet Armys). On October 8, 1942 Archbishop Nikanor and [[Mstyslav (Skrypnyk) of KyivKiev|Bishop Mstyslav]] of the [[UAOC ]] and Metropolitan Oleksiy (Hromadsky) of the Ukrainian Autonomous Orthodox Church entered into an Act of Union at the Pochayiv (Pochaev) Lavra uniting these two church hierarchies. German occupation authorities and pro-Russian hierarchs of the Autonomous Church convinced Metropolitan Oleksiy to withdraw his signature. Metropolitan Oleksiy was executed in Volynia on May 7, 1943 by UPA ([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ukrainian_Insurgent_Army Ukrainian Insurgent Army]) insurgents.

The Russian Orthodox Church regained its general monopoly after World War II in the Ukrainian SSR. Most of the other churches were liquidated, as the Soviet government only recognized the Moscow Patriarchate (MP). The MP was revived at the time of the Russian Revolution, as the only legitimate church in most of the Soviet Union. Many accused it of being a puppet of the Communist Party. After the suspicious death of Patriarch [[Patriarch Tikhon of Moscow]] some churches sought to remain independent of Moscow; something that was tolerated until after World War II. In the post-war years, many Ukrainian Orthodox clergy not affiliated with Moscow fled to Germany or the United States. The UAOC in [[Ukraine]] was then liquidated by the Soviets with the assistance of the Moscow Patriarchate. Any UAOC hierarchs or clergy who remained in Ukraine and refused to join the Russian Church were executed or sent to concentration camps. A few years later the same thing happened to the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church in Western Ukraine (Galicia) and Transcarpathia.