FOR THE RECORD: Clergy seek recognition of UCC's sacrifices (08/13/00)

FOR THE RECORD: Clergy seek recognition of UCC's sacrifices

Following is the text of an open letter dated June 6 from the priests of the Przemyszl (Peremyshl)-Warsaw Metropolitanate of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church to Cardinal Roger Etchegaray, president of the [Vatican] Committee for the Great Jubilee of AD 2000.

Your Eminence:

For the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church the Great Jubilee of the Year 2000 is the culmination of several important anniversaries that we have had the opportunity of celebrating during the past few years. In 1988 the Millennium of the Baptism of Kyivan Rus' took place. The principal event of that jubilee was a solemn celebration in Rome, which lasted several days and was presided over by Pope John Paul II. However, it was only Ukrainians in the diaspora who were able to share in the joy of this jubilee of the Baptism. It was overshadowed by the situation of our Church in Ukraine itself, where it had been officially liquidated by the Communist regime in 1946, persecuted and forced to operate underground.

A few years after these Millennium celebrations, the Soviet empire fell apart. Ukraine achieved independence, and the most difficult period in the history of our Church came to an end. Thanks to this, in 1996 the Greek-Catholics in Ukraine were able to celebrate solemnly the 400th anniversary of the Union of Brest through which the Kyiv Metropolitanate at renewed its unity with the Apostolic See of Rome. The whole community of our Church gathered in Rome on the occasion of the anniversary of the Union of Brest, and John Paul II, bishop of Rome, shared the joy at having regained freedom.

In light of the trials and tribulations through the history of our Church, especially during this last century, we were especially looking forward to the Commemoration of the Witnesses of the Faith in the 20th Century (Rome, Colosseum, May 7). With great pain and dismay we ascertained that, in recalling those Christians who had paid witness to their faith under Soviet totalitarianism, there was not a single representative from the multitude of martyrs and confessors of the faith, bishops, priests and laity who belonged to the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church. We are not saying this from any unhealthy motive of vainglory. We realize that, to the extent that we are spiritually descended from such witnesses to Christ, it is for us a challenge and an obligation to live in faith following their example.

Indeed, as John Paul II wrote in his apostolic letter on the occasion of the 400th anniversary of the Union of Brest, wherein he demonstrated [our Church's] heroic quality as an example for all Christians:

"The whole Catholic community recalls with deep emotion the victims of such great suffering: the martyrs and confessors of the faith of the Church in Ukraine offer us a magnificent lesson in fidelity even at the price of life itself. And we, the favored witnesses of their sacrifice, are aware that they helped to maintain the dignity of a world which seemed overwhelmed by atrocities. They knew the truth, and the truth set them free. Christians in Europe and throughout the world, pausing in prayer before the concentration camps and prisons."

We appeal to Your Eminence, encouraged by the words of John Paul II that the Greek-Catholic Church should rediscover "its own active role it in the Church and in history." We have the duty to show gratitude to our martyrs and confessors, thanks to whom in recent history our Church survived several decades of being sorely tried, and we must remember them. We believe also, that by their prayers, and with our brothers and sisters in the faith, we shall be able to realize appropriately this active role.

With profound esteem,
Yours sincerely in Christ,

The Rev. Bohdan Panczak
and 29 other clergymen.

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