FACES AND PLACES: Doing the dance diaspora: reflections on ethnonational survival (10/04/98)

FACES AND PLACES

by Myron B. Kuropas

Doing the dance diaspora: reflections on ethnonational survival

For over 30 years now, the diaspora has been dancing around the question of ethnonational survival in North America. The tempo, it seems, tends to pick up during the month of October.

Last October, for example, The Washington Group devoted its annual conference to the theme "We Can Do Better," suggesting of course, that our community was not doing well and needed to improve.

This October, the Ukrainian American Professionals and Businesspersons Association of New York and New Jersey is sponsoring the "The Year 2020 Conference." The major question to be addressed is: "Will there be a North American Ukrainian diaspora in the year 2020, and does it matter - to us, to our descendants, or to Ukraine?"

On October 29-31 the Ukrainian Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies and the Robert F. Harney Professorship and Program in Ethnic, Immigration and Pluralism Studies at the University of Toronto are sponsoring an academic conclave devoted to the theme "Cross-Stitching Cultural Borders: Comparing Ukrainian Experience in Canada and the United States."

These conferences will, in one way or another, discuss the future of the Ukrainian diaspora. And, I'm sure, they will identify the reasons for our decline and what we must do to survive and, hopefully, thrive once again.

How serious is our descent as a community? Pretty sobering, I'm afraid. For me, the best indices of community health are Church and fraternal association membership statistics. Historically our Churches have created and maintained both our spiritual and a national identity, while our fraternal benefit societies have nurtured both. It is no exaggeration to say that what we are today we owe to our Churches and fratenals. Without these two institutions, we probably would have never shed our Rusyn past and established ourselves as a unique ethnonational entity on these shores.

How strong are these two institutions today? Numbers are still heading south. Ukrainian Catholic Church membership declined from 281,253 in 1967 to 117,741 in 1997. Unfortunately, reliable statistics are unavailable for Ukrainian Orthodox and Baptists, but I suspect that their numbers aren't much better.

How important are our Churches? Without them, we don't exist. Of all the institutions in our community, it is the Churches that still command a loyal, if somewhat older, following. Other organizations come and go, but when all else disappears our Churches will remain.

Religion has always been an integral part of our ethnonational identity, and that is why our Churches have survived in North America for over 110 years. And, in those areas where some accommodation has been made to the inevitability of assimilation, parishes are doing fine. Take a look at the Catholic churches of Mount Carmel, Pa., and Calgary, Alberta, if you want to see what our future holds. Church membership there is largely third- and fourth-generation Ukrainian, and many faithful are non-Ukrainians.

Our fraternals are in peril. Membership in the Ukrainian National Association, our largest mutual benefit society, declined from a high of 89,207 in 1967 to a low of 57,209 in 1997. Only 944 new members were organized in the United States last year and 208 in Canada. In 1990, the UNA boasted of a reserve totaling almost $21 million. By 1997, this fell to less than 5 million.

I was unable to get reliable statistics for the Ukrainian Fraternal Association. The Providence Association of Ukrainian Catholics is experiencing a drop in membership and reserves, while the Ukrainian National Aid Association (Narodna Pomich) is being forced to merge with the UNA because of its poor financial situation.

Although the UNA remains our strongest fraternal, consider this: During the last eight years, the UNA's 15-story "skyscraper" has been sold; Svoboda, a 105-year-old newspaper published as a daily since the 1920s, has been reduced to a weekly publication; Veselka, a magazine for children, has been discontinued; the UNA Washington Office has been terminated; dividends for individual policies have been suspended; Soyuzivka is now open for only three months a year and some are fearful that it may be sold; there is even a fear among some UNA'ers that The Ukrainian Weekly may soon become extinct.

Some UNA delegates argued at our last convention that all of these reductions were inevitable, that when we continue to lose members (2,142 members in 1997, replaced by an enrollment of only 944) we can't go on subsidizing various fraternal benefits as we did in the past. True enough. But no one bothered to ask why it is that the UNA is losing ground, while other ethnic fraternals are not.

Here's a little history lesson. Prior to World War I, most of America's first immigrants from what is today Ukraine identified themselves as Rusyns. They established two fraternal benefit societies in the early 1890s. The first was Soiedyneniie, founded in 1892, known today as the Greek Catholic Union (GCU). The second was the Ruskyi Narodnyi Soyuz, founded in 1894, today known as the UNA. The GCU remained largely Rusyn, the UNA did not.

One hundred years later, the UNA is declining, the GCU is growing. Of the top 40 fraternals in 1990, the GCU was 14th in terms of total assets, while the UNA was 36th. In terms of life insurance in force, the GCU was 38th, while the UNA didn't make the top 40. Between 1992 and 1996, GCU reserves increased from $7 million to $16 million, and total assets increased from $175 million to $200 million. GCU membership dropped slightly during this period, but dividends were continued. Question. Do the Rusyns known something we don't?

I believe that as our Churches and fraternals go, so goes the community. During the last 110 years of our existence, no institution has replaced the Church. Nor have any organizations supplanted our fraternals. Our federal credit unions may provide more fraternal benefits in the future, but that would mean a substantial expansion of their mandate.

So let's stop looking for alternatives. There are none. Our Churches and fraternals have a proven record; they're still around after 110 years; they remain our best hope for the future. You want to renew our community? Stop doing the dance diaspora and go to church. Join the UNA!

Myron Kuropas' e-mail address is: [email protected]

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