Greeted as head of state in Kyiv (07/01/01)

Greeted as head of state in Kyiv

by Roman Woronowycz
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV - Pope John Paul II arrived in Kyiv on June 23 for the beginning of his first visit to Ukraine with all the pomp and circumstance afforded a head of state, but also as the spiritual leader of 6 million Roman and Greek-Catholic faithful.

The journey came amidst continued and vociferous protest and denunciations of the visit from the Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Moscow Patriarchate (UOC-MP), which is under the aegis of the Russian Orthodox Church. It was criticism that would continue throughout the pope's five days in the country.

The pope attempted to resolve the matter in his first address to the Ukrainian people. After being greeted by Ukraine's President Leonid Kuchma and a host of religious and state dignitaries, Pope John Paul II, frail and hunched over, holding his speech with hands shaking from Parkinson's disease, said that he wants "dialogue and cooperation."

"I have not come here with the intention of proselytization, but to bear witness to Christ together with all Christians of every Church and ecclesial community," he emphasized.

Referring to himself as a "pilgrim of peace," Pope John Paul II asked for and offered forgiveness in his first address in Ukraine, a country he referred to as "the meeting place of the spiritual treasures of East and West."

"As we ask for forgiveness for the errors committed in both the distant and recent past, let us in turn offer forgiveness for the wrongs endured," said the holy father.

For weeks, the UOC-MP and its mother Church, the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC), had charged that the papal visit was an overt and bold attempt to proselytize and convert some portion of the Ukrainian population, a majority of which belong to the UOC-MP. The Church has lost a good portion of its faithful to two separatist Orthodox Churches that arose after Ukraine declared independence with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. Others returned to the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church (UGCC), to which they or their parents had belonged before the Church was absorbed into the ROC by government order in 1946.

The pope would repeat his words of accommodation and conciliation to the ROC and the UOC-MP in different forms as one of three central tenets of his visit, the other two being: a call for return to basic Christian morals in the quickly changing world of the 21st century; and recognition of the suffering and sacrifice of the UGCC during the years of Soviet domination.

He also repeatedly referred to the need for Ukrainians to achieve cooperation and unity, while reminding them of the heralded history of Kyiv, which he referred to as the "cradle of Eastern faith of this region" in several addresses.

His visit caused unprecedented security precautions, which some organizers explained had led in part to unexpectedly small turnouts at the two planned masses in which the holy father participated.

In the days before the pontiff's arrival, state militia forces had sent notices to apartment dwellers residing on the streets the papal motorcade would cover during its stops at various points within the city center that they should not open windows or balcony doors facing those streets, should remove heavy objects on balconies and stay indoors as the motorcades passed.

While Minister of Foreign Affairs Anatolii Zlenko, who headed the state organizing committee that laid the plans for the papal visit, assured reporters prior to the pope's arrival that he had spoken with militia officials about the matter, nothing evidently changed.

Kyivans were never told where or when they might greet the pope during his movement around the city. The streets on which the pope traveled were for the most part bare except for those pedestrians who happened to be walking the streets at the time. And those who were coming out of subways were often stopped from moving out onto the street until the motorcade had passed even as the pope sat in his glass enclosed popemobile waving to almost no one.

Presidential Administration Chief of Staff Volodymyr Lytvyn explained on June 25 that law enforcement officials had decided to keep security tight and access to the pope limited due to various terrorist threats it had received.

"Our law enforcement officials received many faxes, telephone calls and anonymous letters and they were such that they decided the highest security levels were required," explained Mr. Lytvyn.

The pope's low profile led directly or indirectly to low turnouts at both services celebrated with the holy father in attendance, which were the two main opportunities for the public to see Pope John Paul II and hear him speak.

The Rev. Ken Nowakowski, spokesman for the UGCC press office said that the low turnouts resulted from a combination of reasons.

"There was less turnout than expected for three main reasons," explained the Rev. Nowakowski. "First the weather had been threatening and was not very cooperative. Second, it was difficult for many people to make their way out there, and third because it was publicized that security was very tight. So many people simply decided it would be better to stay at home and watch it on television."

Even with the barriers, real and imagined, some 100,000 managed to get to the Chaika Aerodrome, some eight miles from Kyiv's city center. Many of them began arriving at about 2 a.m. Although city officials provided free transportation from the furthest outgoing subway stop, attendees still had to trudge nearly two kilometers, part of it through open fields.

After waiting for hours, sometimes sitting on small stools or lying on blankets they brought with themselves, but just as often simply standing, they saw Pope John Paul II arrive at the aerodrome and proceed up the elevator especially built to accommodate him. The magnificent stage resembled a large wooden ship with large sails made of cloth that gave life to the structures as they flapped in the wind of the open field. While its designers, a Kyivan theatrical design firm that won an open competition, said the stage symbolized Noah's Ark, Catholic officials explained that for them it represented the Church as it carries its faithful through the turbulent waters of life.

In cold drizzly rain, the faithful waved the national flags of Ukraine, Poland, Belarus and Russia, and clapped and sang, while repeatedly chanting "We love you, Your Holiness," "You are Peter," and "Ukraine loves the pope." An announcer said that pilgrims from Hungary, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Belarus, Russia, Uzbekistan, Kazakstan, Georgia, Germany, Italy, France, Romania, the United States and all the regions of Ukraine were present.

As with three of the four liturgies and masses the pope celebrated, the first mass was in Ukrainian as was the pope's sermon. Recently named Roman Catholic Cardinal Marian Jaworski, archbishop of Lviv concelebrated the Mass with the holy father. UGCC Cardinal Lubomyr Husar observed from the side, but did not take an active part in the Latin-rite liturgy.

In his 20-minute talk, Pope John Paul II stressed Ukraine's links to both the East and the West, while drawing parallels of the sacrifice that Ukrainian Catholics have endured to the sacrifice made by St. John the Baptist.

"Land of Ukraine, drenched with the blood of martyrs, thank you for the example of fidelity to the Gospel which you have given to Christians all over the world," said Pope John Paul II.

At the end of the nearly three-hour service the pope greeted the pilgrims in seven languages, telling them "Jesus needs your faith and service."

Attendance fell for the second liturgy, celebrated in the Byzantine Rite of the UGCC. But the crowd, estimated to be between 30,000 and 50,000, was just as exuberant.

Hundreds of blue-and-yellow banners flapped above the crowd on another blustery day as Winnipeg Metropolitan Michael Bdzel, Philadelphia Metropolitan Stephen Soroka, Bishop Mykhailo Sobrykha of the Ternopil Eparchy and Archbishop Vasylyi Medbit of the Kyiv-Vyshhorod Exarchate joined Cardinal Husar, the primate of the UGCC, before the altar erected at the Chaika Aerodrome.

Looking drawn and tired, the pope watched from his chair at the back of the altar below the icon to Our Lady of Zarvanytsia. The icon is believed to have healing powers and had been brought to Kyiv especially at the pope's request.

During his second sermon the pope cited the grand Christian history of Kyivan Rus', whose capital, Kyiv, he called the "new Jerusalem," and the "mother of Slavic Christianity in Eastern Europe," while referring to the Dnipro River that cuts through the city as the "Jordan of Ukraine."

He continued his call for unity among Ukrainians. He also honored the UGCC for the sacrifice it endured during its years underground and the renaissance it has seen in the last decade.

"From this land, sanctified by the blood of a whole host of martyrs, I raise with you my prayer to the Lord that all Christians may once again be one," said the holy father.

The icon of the Our Lady of Zarvanytsia held a special place in the pope's visit to Kyiv. He had requested that it be made available so that he could pray before it, and it became his first stop after he landed at Boryspil Airport.

The pope arrived at the St. Nicholas Church of the UGCC at the shrine of Askold's Tomb, where the icon was on display just as the second cloudburst of the day began. Vatican and Ukrainian security personnel escorted the smiling and waving holy pontiff from the limousine in which he rode into the small, chapel-like church. He spent 10 minutes venerating the Blessed Virgin Mary, who he has said for years holds a special place in his heart.

While the pope was inside, the rain stopped rather quickly, and just as he was exiting the sun broke through the clouds, causing some of the faithful on hand to quietly mutter that it was the blessed icon performing another miracle.

Outside, the pope entered his popemobile and began the short journey to the city center.

During his two and a half days in Kyiv, Pope John Paul II made quick and quiet side trips to honor those murdered by the two totalitarian regimes that scourged this country through much of the 20th century.

On June 24 in the woods outside Bykivnia, a small village bordering Kyiv, the pope memorialized and paid tribute to the thousands of Ukrainian religious and political leaders, artists, writers and teachers who were executed there during Stalin's Great Terror.

On June 25 he paid his respects to the 32,000 Jews massacred by the Nazis at Babyn Yar in a 72-hour time period and to the tens of thousands of Jews and Kyiv residents of other nationalities murdered there.

The pope also visited St. Alexander's Roman Catholic Church on the last day of his Kyiv trip and met with political and business leaders at Mariinsky Palace. On the first day of his stay in the capital, his most anxiously awaited meeting came during his time with the Ukrainian Council of Churches and Religious Organizations, a group of leaders representing all the mainstream faiths practiced in Ukraine.

Sixteen of the 17 leaders of the largest religious confessions met with the head of the Catholic Church on June 24 at Kyiv Symphony Hall. Not present was Metropolitan Volodymyr Sabodan of the UOC-MP, which had said from the outset that its leader would not meet with the pope.

Calling the meeting a "family gathering" and again underscoring the single Christian roots from which Catholicism and Orthodoxy sprang, the pope also cited the tragedy of the Jews at Babyn Yar and the deportation of Crimean Tatars - most of whom were Muslims - after World War II, as well as the Bykivnia massacre and the Great Famine of 1932-1933.

However, the most interesting moment occurred at the very beginning of the hourlong meeting, when during introductions the leaders of the other two Orthodox confessions, Patriarch Filaret of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church - Kyiv Patriarchate and Metropolitan Mefodii of the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church kissed the holy pontiff on both cheeks. At the end of the meeting they repeated their actions, clearly in response to threats from ROC Patriarch Aleksei II that any private discussions between what his Church considers illegal, non-canonical elements of Ukrainian Orthodoxy and the pope could lead to a breakdown in relations between Moscow and the Vatican.

Patriarch Filaret managed also to stir up the controversy a bit when he told the pope in his official remarks that "the Moscow patriarch is frightened by proselytization."

"We believe that your visit to Ukraine will help to advance the development of an Orthodox-Catholic dialogue and will not deepen the divide, as Moscow foresees" he stated.

Pope John Paul II did not visit the Monastery of the Caves or St. Sofia Sobor - this country's two most sacred religious shrines - during his stay in Kyiv. His press secretary, Joaquin Navarro-Valls, explained that St. Sofia is a museum and the holy father never intended to make a stop there because he only visits active shrines. Nonetheless, some 20 activists of the UOC-MP stood guard outside the church's main bell tower on the first day of the papal visit to Kyiv.

His visit to the Monastery of the Caves also was never seriously considered because the UOC-MP headquarters are located there. However, on June 23, as the pope paid a visit to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, which stands several hundred meters from the Monastery of the Caves complex, he turned toward the golden cupolas that dot the hillside marking the site of one of the oldest monastic retreats in the world and made a sign of the cross while reciting a prayer.

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