The history of the Greek-Catholic Church in Kazakstan (10/07/01)

The history of the Greek-Catholic Church in Kazakstan

Religious Information Service of Ukraine

With the liquidation of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church (UGCC) in Ukraine in 1946, all its bishops and many priests were arrested and sent to concentration camps. After Stalin's death many priests were freed. The majority decided to work in the underground all across the Soviet Union, serving exiled Catholics who had been forbidden to return to Ukraine. This, in fact, was the beginning of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church in Kazakstan, where thousands of Ukrainians from western Ukraine had been deported since 1939.

In the late 1950s many priests ministered on a regular basis, mostly in Karaganda, which had the largest community of exiled Ukrainians. Among those who served were Bishop Oleksander Khyra, Father Oleksei Zarytskyi, Father Nykolai Shaban and Father Stepan Pryshliak, to mention but a few.

At first they had to meet in huts or at parishioners' homes. This did not, however, prevent the priests from serving liturgy, hearing confessions, and performing baptisms and weddings.

In 1979 Catholics in Karaganda received permission to build a church. Beginning that year Greek-Catholic priests had the opportunity to conduct liturgies in the Roman Catholic church.

In the early 1990s priests from Ukraine started to come to Karaganda. In 1996 the German charitable foundation Renovabis erected a little wooden church at the request of the Greek-Catholics.

At the end of that same year the pope appointed Bishop Basil Medvit of the Order of St. Basil the Great (OSBM) the apostolic visitator for the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic communities in Kazakstan and Central Asia. On Christmas Day 1997 Bishop Medvit conducted his first visitation of the Kazak communities.

In April 1997 Father Basil Hovera arrived in Karaganda for religious ministry. Also that year, on Palm Sunday, Bishop Medvit, Archbishop Marian Oles and Bishop Jan Pavel Lenga, the local Roman Catholic prelate, consecrated the Church of the Protection of the Mother of God in Karaganda. A few months later, at Bishop Medvit's request Father Vidal Klymchuk OSBM arrived in Karaganda from Brazil to stay for two years.

The congregation in Karaganda has gradually begun to expand. Of great importance is the fact that more middle-aged people as well as youngsters and children began to attend the church. Separate services are now held for youth.

Since Karaganda is a large city, many parishioners were confronted with the problem of commuting to the church. Therefore, another church was opened in the district where Greek-Catholics reside. The German foundation Aid to the Church in Need donated money to purchase the facility. On June 3 of this year Bishops Medvit and Lenga consecrated the new chapel.

After his first visit to Kazakstan Bishop Medvit requested that nuns be sent to start a mission in the country. For two years three sisters have been coming to Karaganda every month to teach catechism.

In June 2000 Sisters Vinkentia Nazarkevych, Mariana Yakymets and Mykhailyna Hornakevych arrived in Karaganda, where they opened the Holy Trinity House and started youth meetings and catechism classes.

Since Bishop Medvit was appointed visitator to Karaganda, he has visited Kazakstan every year, meeting with parishioners in Karaganda and other cities. In April 1999 Father Irynei Babynets and Brother Anatolii Holovchuk, both Basilians, came to Pavlodar from Ukraine. With the permission of Bishop Lenga, services were held on the premises of the cathedral.

In June 2000 with the help of the Ukrainian diaspora in the United States and Aid to the Church in Need, Father Babynets purchased a large house in Pavlodar, intending to make it into a church. This year on May 20 Bishop Medvit, Archbishop Oles and Bishop Tomash Peta, the apostolic administrator of Astana, consecrated the Church of Ss. Peter and Paul.

During the last year of his religious service in Kazakstan Father Babynets helped start two other congregations outside Pavlodar: in Shidertakh (180 kilometers from Pavlodar) and Berezovka (190 kilometers from Pavlodar), where he regularly comes to serve.

In 1999 Bishop Medvit came to Astana, the new capital of Kazakstan, where he visited the Ukrainian educational complex and met with the Ukrainian community. Since then Father Hovera has been coming from Karaganda to Astana every month to hold a service for the local congregation in the capital's Roman Catholic church. On May 27 of this year Bishop Medvit celebrated divine liturgy in Astana.

Throughout the last four years the number of Greek-Catholic congregations has increased from one to seven (two in Karaganda, one each in the Karaganda region, Astana and Pavlodar, and two in the Pavlodar region). It is possible to start new congregations, though this is rather difficult right now due to the lack of clergy.

The UGCC also has three seminary students from Kazakstan, one of them studying in Ukraine and two in Karaganda. Step by step the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church is growing stronger in this Central Asian country.

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Readers interested in more specific information on the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church in Kazakstan may contact: Father Basil Hovera, 3 Pischevaya St., 470042, Karaganda, Kazakstan; telephone/fax, 007 (3212) 482564; e-mail, [email protected].

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