Newly consecrated Bishop Hlib Lonchyna celebrates first liturgy (03/24/02)

Newly consecrated Bishop Hlib Lonchyna celebrates first liturgy

Religious Information Service of Ukraine

LVIV - Father Hlib Lonchyna was ordained to the episcopacy of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church (UGCC) at St. George Cathedral in Lviv on February 27. In accordance with the Julian calendar this was the feast of St. Cyril, apostle to the Slavs. Cardinal Lubomyr Husar, head of the UGCC, Metropolitan Stefan Soroka of Philadelphia and Bishop Yulian Voronovskyi of Sambir-Drohobych were the ordaining bishops. Bishop Lonchyna, who will serve as auxiliary bishop of the Lviv archeparchy (patriarchal curia of the UGCC), was granted the titular see of Bareta.

On March 1 Bishop Lonchyna served his first episcopal liturgy at the Lviv Theological Academy, where he had previously been a teacher. His mother, Orysia, and sister, Natalia, were present at the liturgy. His brother, Father Taras Lonchyna, and a number of other priests concelebrated the liturgy. In addition to family, friends, staff and students of the academy, a number of Bishop Lonchyna's former students also came for the liturgy.

Father Borys Gudziak, rector of the LTA, thanked Bishop Lonchyna and mentioned some interesting biographical facts: Bishop Lonchyna and his brother were both longtime members of the Plast Ukrainian Scouting Organization in the United States. The new bishop came from a long line of priests, though his late father, Bohdan, was a lay activist in the Church and a philologist.

Father Gudziak then presented Bishop Lonchyna, a senator of the newly founded Ukrainian Catholic University, with recordings and transcribed interviews from the academy's Institute of Church History telling of the activities of the bishop's relatives in Ukraine.

Bishop Lonchyna then told the congregation, students and staff of the academy, and others in attendance: "I was formed in this atmosphere which Metropolitan Andrey founded and Patriarch Josyf continued in the diaspora. So I feel that I am one of you." The bishop reminded all that "the Church is not you, not me, but we." He then gave the congregation the Old Testament blessing of Aaron, and gave each of the faithful his episcopal blessing.

Bishop Lonchyna returned to the chapel of the Lviv Theological Academy to serve an episcopal liturgy on Saturday, March 2, for the catechists of the LTA's Cathechetical-Pedagogical Institute. Sister Luiza Ciupa, SSMI, director of the institute, had invited Bishop Hlib. As part of a day of recollection for the catechists, after the liturgy Bishop Lonchyna shared his memories of Patriarch Josyf with the catechists. In honor of the 100th anniversary of Patriarch Josyf's birth, the UGCC has proclaimed 2002 the "Year of Slipyj" and is marking it in various ways.

Biographical information

Hlib Lonchyna, Monk of the Studite Order (MSU), was born February 23, 1954, in Steubenville, Ohio. He completed his studies in philosophy and theology in Rome at the Papal Urbanian University and at the Papal Oriental Institute, where he received his doctorate in liturgy in 2001. He was tonsured at the Monastery of St. Theodore the Studite in Grottaferrata (Italy) where he received his schema on December 19, 1976. He was ordained a priest on July 3, 1977, and for several years served at St. Nicholas Parish in Passaic, N.J.

From 1994 to 2000 he served as the spiritual director for Lviv's Holy Spirit Seminary and taught Old Testament courses at the Lviv Theological Academy. He also was chaplain for the Faith and Light community in Ukraine. Faith and Light is an international movement, connected with the better-known L'Arche movement, where the developmentally delayed, their parents and friends form informal communities. In 2000 and 2001 he served as the attaché for the apostolic nunciature in Kyiv.

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