LETTERS TO THE EDITOR (02/20/00)

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

FDR gave Stalin half of Europe

Dear Editor:

Boris Danik's letter (January 30) attacks Myron Kuropas' recent column criticizing Franklin Roosevelt as "standard rote FDR bashing." Leaving the economics discussion to the economists, what Dr. Kuropas wrote about FDR's foreign policy failures were simple facts. One does not have to be a conservative Republican (as Mr. Danik charges) to admit that FDR did turn over half of Europe to Stalin. There is a plethora of evidence today about the Soviet agents who penetrated the highest levels of Roosevelt's government.

Dr. Kuropas' articles are always well-written and thought-provoking. His recent column on the Cuban refugee boy, Elian Gonzalez, was especially outstanding in pointing out the hypocrisy of Western liberals who refuse to see the reality of the Communist "workers' paradise."

The Ukrainian Weekly is definitely enriched by the excellent writings of Dr. Kuropas.

Leo Iwaskiw
Philadelphia

Weekly is useful for assignments

Dear Editor:

I am writing to congratulate you on the wonderful job that I think your newspaper is doing in presenting events both in Ukraine and in the Ukrainian community in the United States and Canada. This is the first year that I have subscribed to your paper and I must congratulate you on your work.

My daughter, who is the sixth grade in the Ukrainian Heritage School, has a weekly assignment of searching for current events. The materials that the students use can be in either Ukrainian or in English, but they must deal with events in Ukraine or with the Ukrainian diaspora. Most of the time my daughter uses The Ukrainian Weekly as her source for information. She has utilized many different sections of the paper, although I must admit that the sports section and anything dealing with President Leonid Kuchma (whom she saw this summer during a visit to Ukraine) are her personal favorites.

Terenia Zmurkewycz
Philadelphia

Kuropas column was uncalled for

Dear Editor:

Dr. Myron B. Kuropas should not have written his latest column "OUN from Konovalets to Plaviuk" (February 6), and The Weekly should not have published it.

I knew many of the people whom the columnist criticizes. Dr. Kuropas should remain serenely seated on his warm chair, and should thank God for his peaceful life. He should not disparage people who even today continue to give their lives for Ukraine.

To me it is very important to express this view, having lived through very difficult historic times.

Irene Kmetyk
Albuquerque, N.M.

Feast is Theophany - not Epiphany

Dear Editor:

In your January 30 issue you reported that Patriarch Filaret, Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Kyiv Patriarchate, officiated at the Epiphany [sic] ceremony in Kyiv on January 19. He did not. The Eastern Church does not celebrate the Epiphany; we celebrate the Theophany ("Bohoiavlennia"), that is the first scriptural revelation of the Triune God. This is occasioned by the baptism of Jesus in the Jordan River.

While the Epiphany and Theophany are essentially the same liturgical celebration, like the Assumption and Dormition of the Theotokos, there are important distinctions. The Theophany is doxological in focus; it is at once a particular celebration of the baptism of Jesus (the Western Church celebrates the baptism separately, if at all, usually the preceding week); and, importantly, in the Byzantine tradition it includes the Great Sanctification of Water with all its wealthy implications of purification (entirely absent in the Western Church).

Moreover, like the Dormition of the Theotokos, the Theophany celebration is the older theological tradition, and ecumenical.

Oles Cheren
Mansfield, Ohio

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