1983: A LOOK BACK: News in Ukrainian Churches (12/25/83)

1983: A LOOK BACK

News in Ukrainian Churches

1983 was a year of expansion and activity for both the Ukrainian Catholic and Ukrainian Orthodox Churches.

Pope John Paul II on December 20 announced the formation of a new eparchy for Ukrainian Catholics in the United States, with its seat in Parma, Ohio. It will be headed by Bishop Robert Moskal.

An extraordinary sobor of the Ukrainian Greek Orthodox Church of Canada took place on November 26-27 during which the membership of the sobor increased to five. Two priests were elevated to bishops, Bishop Wasyl was elevated to archbishop and a bishops' cathedral was designated in Vancouver.

Earlier in the year, Patriarch Josyf Slipyj opened the Synod of Ukrainian Catholic Bishops in Rome. The synod opened on January 30 and ran through February 12. During this time the Rev. Michael Hrynchyshyn was consecrated bishop for Ukrainian Catholics in France, a post vacated by Bishop Volodymyr Malanchuk because of poor health. The patriarch's 91st birthday and the 20th anniversary of his release from the Soviet Union were also marked during the synod.

On March 25, the Feast of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin, the Rev. Slavomir Miklovs was consecrated bishop of the Krizevci Eparchy for Ukrainian Catholics in Yugoslavia. He succeeded Bishop Joachim Segedi who had held the post after the death of Bishop Gabriel Bukatko.

Metropolitan Maxim Hermaniuk of Canada was selected as an ex-officio member to represent Ukrainian Catholics at the International Synod of Bishops held in October in Rome. It was during this synod that Archbishop-Coadjutor Myroslav Lubachivsky delivered an address to the bishops about the Ukrainian Catholic Church of Silence. He spoke about the annihilation of the Ukrainian Catholic Church by the Soviet regime and noted that this Church lives on "amid unbelievable difficulties and hardships." During his address he also cited the case of Yosyf Terelia, a layman who heads the Committee for the Defense of the Ukrainian Catholic Church in Ukraine.

Earlier in the year, on July 7, Pope John Paul II met with a group of Ukrainian Catholic University summer students, during which the pontiff, speaking in Ukrainian, promised the group to do all he could to help Mr. Terelia and assured them that the Ukrainian people and the Ukrainian Catholic Church are always in his prayers.

This year was also a year of anniversary celebrations and commemorations.

The Ukrainian Catholic faithful on November 12-13 marked the 25th anniversary of the establishment of the Metropolitan See of the Ukrainian Catholic Church in the United States. On September 11, the Ukrainian Catholic Seminary on the grounds of St. Basil's College, celebrated its 50th anniversary during the annual Connecticut Day Festival. Both jubilee events were attended by the Ukrainian Catholic hierarchs of the United States.

Probably the most impressive number of clergy and nuns from all over the United States and Canada gathered in Chicago during a three-day "Ukrainian Youth for Christ" Convention held on November 11-13. The convention, initiated by the Rev. Marian Butrynsky under the patronage of Bishop Innocent Lotocky, was planned by youth, for youth. The convention was organized to mark the 50th anniversary of the "Youth for Christ" march held in Lviv in 1933 under the auspices of Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytsky, and it attracted over 400 youths, both Catholics and Orthodox. During the weekend convention, participants attended workshops on such themes as religious persecution in the Soviet Union, Christian moral ethics and religious themes in contemporary films.

They also took part in the 50th anniversary manifestation to mark the first such gathering and, along with the Chicago-area community, in a solemn rally and prayer service held at Holy Name Cathedral to commemorate the Great Famine in Ukraine. Cardinal Joseph Bernardin of Chicago attended the service, along with Ukrainian Catholic Bishops Lotocky, Basil Losten, Isidore Borecky and Miklovs and numerous other representatives of all denominations.

The leaders of the Ukrainian Orthodox and Ukrainian Catholic Churches took part in famine observances throughout the year. Metropolitan Mstyslav of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, who marked his 85th birthday this year, hosted the South Bound Brook commemorations at St. Andrew's Memorial Church, the seat of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church in the United States, on May 15. He also traveled to Washington on October 2 to take part in the national famine commemorations attended by over 18,000 Ukrainians.

During the week prior to the national commemorations of the famine, a Ukrainian Catholic priest from Chicago, the Rev. Peter Galadza, along with Lutheran Pastor John Shep and the Rev. Taras Lonchyna, a Ukrainian Catholic priest from Washington, staged a five-day fast and prayer vigil for the 7 million victims of the famine in Ukraine. Toward the end of the week, the Rev. Galadza and Pastor Shep were arrested at the Soviet Embassy gate after performing a memorial service there. They were charged with disorderly conduct and fined $10. They did, however, manage to slip a Bible under the embassy gate. U.S. Ukrainian Catholic bishops issued an appeal to their faithful to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the holocaust in Ukraine. All of them later joined the national famine committee as part of its honorary presidium.

Many Ukrainian parishes throughout the United States and Canada took part in famine commemorations this year, holding memorial prayer services and panakhydas, as well as organizing food drives and buses to travel to the commemorations in Washington.

The World Congress of Free Ukrainians sent a lengthy memorandum to the World Council of Churches, which held a three-week congress in Vancouver in mid-summer. The WCFU document appealed the WCC members to raise "their voices in protest against the crass and inhumane persecution of all religions in Ukraine, particularly the Ukrainian Catholic and the Ukrainian Orthodox Churches, which have been outlawed in contravention to all written commitments of the USSR, including the Soviet Constitution, which assures all citizens their inalienable rights to practice the religion of their choice."

During the Fourth World Congress of Free Ukrainians just recently concluded in Toronto, representatives of Ukrainian Churches issued a statement in regard to celebrations of the millennium of Christianity in Ukraine. They decided to hold jubilee molebens on the international, national and local levels at midnight (Kiev time) on August 13, 1988; to hold an ecumenical Ukrainian commemoration of the millennium during the Fifth WCFU; and to jointly prepare a Ukrainian edition of the Gospels, Epistles and daily prayers.

This was also the year that the Ukrainian Catholic Church accepted the painting "Baptism of Rus' Ukraine" by the late Petro Andrusiw as the official millennium painting. An illustrated Bible for children, published in Yugoslavia, became available in the United States, and "A Byzantine Rite Liturgical Year," published by the Basilian Fathers, was translated into English.

All in all, the year was full of activity. The Ukrainian religious were visible in the community as shepherds tending their faithful flock.

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