Ukrainian Greek Catholics, Past and Present

Avvakumov, Yury P.

doi:10.1007/978-3-319-34144-6_2

Yury P. Avvakumov³

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3 Citations

Abstract

Yury Avvakumov introduces the little-understood Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. He sketches the main features of its turbulent history, from the union with Rome (1595–1596) to its liquidation by the Soviets in 1946 and the resurgence of the church since the early 1990s. He describes the church’s unique identity in terms of ecclesiological liminality, or “in-between-ness”—with the Byzantine Greek Orthodoxy of its Kyivan origins on one side and, on the other, the Catholic universality that followed its unification with Rome. Often criticized as a handicap, this liminality has also served as a catalyst for reform, intellectual creativity, and social engagement.

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Notes

1.
Andrew Wilson, The Ukrainians. Unexpected Nation (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2000), p. xi.
2.
For a useful summary of the events of the Revolution of Dignity, see: Euromaidan—History In the Making Gleb Gusev et al., eds. (Kyiv: Osnovy Publishing, 2014). On the Russian war in Ukraine, see the well documented studies: Maksymilian Czuperski et al., Hiding In Plain Sight: Putin’s War in Ukraine (Washington DC: The Atlantic Council, 2015); James Miller et al., An Invasion by Any Other Name: The Kremlin’s Dirty War in Ukraine (New York: Institute of Modern Russia, 2015).
3.
The Blackwell Companion to Eastern Christianity, Ken Parry, ed. (Chichester UK: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010), 207–208.
4.
The Cambridge History of Christianity. Volume 5: Eastern Christianity, Michael Angold, ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 251–370.
5.
Cf.: Hans Urs von Balthasar, Der antirömische Affekt (Freiburg: Herder, 1974).
6.
See the letter of Patriarch Kirill to Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople of 14 August 2014: https://mospat.ru/ru/2014/08/14/news106782/ (Accessed 10/10/2015); the address of Metropolitan Hilarion Alfeyev to the Third General Assembly of the Synod of Catholic bishops on pastoral challenges to the family on 10/16/2014: https://mospat.ru/en/2014/10/16/news109624/ (Accessed 10/21/2015); cf. the rejoinder of the head of the UGCC His Beatitude Sviatoslav Shevchuk: http://risu.org.ua/en/index/all_news/confessional/interchurch_relations/58006/ (Accessed 10/21/2015).
7.
The word was coined by the French priest and theologian Cyrille Korolevskij (Jean-Joseph-François Charon), see: Cyrille Korolevskij, L’Uniatisme. Définition—Causes—Effets—Étendue—Dangers—Remèdes (Gembloux 1927; Irénikon-Collection, 5–6). The term became the main subject of the joint Orthodox-Catholic theological consultation in Balamand (Lebanon) in 1993, which produced a statement “Uniatism, Method of Union of the Past, and the Present Search for Full Communion”: http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/chrstuni/ch_orthodox_docs/rc_pc_chrstuni_doc_19930624_lebanon_en.html (Accessed 21/10/2015).
8.
For overviews of Eastern Catholic Christianity see: P. Galadza, “Eastern Catholic Christianity,” in: Parry, The Blackwell Companion to Eastern Christianity, 291–318; Andriy Mykhaleyko, Die katholischen Ostkirchen (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2012); Catholic Eastern Churches: Heritage and Identity, P. Pallath, ed. (Rome: The St. Thomas Christian Fellowship, 1994). Oriente cattolico. Cenni storici e statistiche. Quarta ed. (Città del Vaticano, 1974) is still useful; there have been no later updates.
9.
See, for example, the classic study: Adrian Fortescue, The Uniate Eastern Churches (London: Burns Oates & Washbourne, 1923; Piscataway, NJ: Gorgias Press, 2001).
10.
Most recently, at a colloquium in Ottawa, May 8–10, 2015; see http://www.sheptytskyinstitute.ca/ugcc-theologians-meet-to-continue-growth-of-scholarly-endeavors/ (Accessed 10/18/2015). [Ed. note: In this volume we follow the official English-language self-designation of the UGCC: the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church.]
11.
For statistics on Eastern Catholic Churches: Galadza, “Eastern Catholic Christianity,” 292. For recent statistics on all Eastern Churches: Johannes Oeldemann, Die Kirchen des christlichen Ostens. Orthodoxe, orientalische und mit Rom unierte Ostkirchen (Kevelaer: Topos, 2006). Overall, statistics on Orthodox Churches are rather approximate and in some cases clearly unrealistic; thus, the Russian Orthodox Church has claimed from 85 to 164 million (cf. Oeldeman, Die Kirchen, 84, and https://www.oikoumene.org/en/member-churches/russian-orthodox-church, accessed 10/10/15) on the grounds that it considers all ethnic Russians in the Russian Federation to be Orthodox (it is instructive to compare the Patriarchate’s claims with the demographic dynamics in Russia, see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Russia#Ethnic_groups, accessed 10/18/2015). Eastern Catholic Churches tend to be more realistic in providing their membership numbers than the Orthodox since they try to follow the standards accepted by the Roman Catholic Church for membership statistics.
12.
For the most recent statistics of churches and religious communities in Ukraine, as of January 1, 2015: http://risu.org.ua/ua/index/resourses/statistics/ukr2015/60129/ (Accessed 18/10/2015).
13.
For a useful collection of documents of church unions: Ernst-Christoph Suttner (ed.), Quellen zur Geschichte der Kirchenunionen des 16. Bis 18. Jahrhunderts (Freiburg: Institut für Ökumenische Studien, 2010). On the general history of unions of Rome with Eastern Churches, the study of Wilhelm De Vries, Rom und die Patriarchate des Ostens (Freiburg/Munich: Karl Alber, 1963) remains very helpful.
14.
The following studies are foundational for English-language scholarship on Sheptytsky: Morality and Reality. The Life and Times of Andrei Sheptyts’kyi, Paul Robert Magocsi, ed. with the assistance of Andrii Krawchuk (Edmonton: Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies, University of Alberta, 1989); Andrii Krawchuk, Christian Social Ethics in Ukraine. The Legacy of Andrei Sheptytsky (Edmonton: CIUS, 1997); Peter Galadza, The Theology and Liturgical Work of Andrei Sheptytsky (1865–1944) (Rome, 2004 = Orientalia Christiana Analecta 272).
15.
On Josyf Slipyj: Jaroslav Pelikan, Confessor between East and West. A Portrait of Ukrainian Cardinal Josyf Slipyj (Grand Rapids MI: Eerdmans, 1990); Andrii Mykhaleyko, Per aspera ad astra. Der Einheitsgedanke im theologischen und pastoralen Werk von Josyf Slipyj (1892–1984). Eine historische Untersuchung (Würzburg: Der christliche Osten, 2009 = Das östliche Christentium, 57).
16.
Borys A. Gudziak, Crisis and Reform (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute, 2001); Andrzej Gil, and Ihor Skoczylas, Kościoły wschodnie w państwie polsko-litewskim w procesie przemian i adaptacji: Metropolia Kijowska w latach 1458–1795 (Lublin and Lwów: Institut Europy Środkowo-Wschodniej, 2014); see also the papers collected in: Internationales Forschungsgespräch der Stiftung PRO ORIENTE zur Brester Union. Erstes Treffen, Johann Marte, ed. (Würzburg: Augustinus-Verl., 2004); Internationales Forschungsgespräch der Stiftung PRO ORIENTE zur Brester Union. Zweites Treffen, Johann Marte, ed. (Würzburg: Augustinus-Verl., 2005); Die Union von Brest (1596) in Geschichte und Geschichtsschreibung: Versuch einer Zwischenbilanz, Johann Marte, and Oleh Turij, eds. (Lviv: Institut für Kirchengeschichte der Ukrainischen Katholischen Universität, 2008).
17.
The concept of “confessional disciplining” which entailed sanctions for every attempt to transcend denominational boundaries, emerged in the German Konfessionalisierungsforschung of the last decades; see, e.g.: Heinz Schilling, “Disziplinierung oder ‘Selbstregulierung’ der Untertanen’? Ein Plädoyer für die Doppelperspektive von Makro- und Mikrohistorie bei der Erforschung der frühmodernen Kirchenzucht,” in Historische Zeitschrift 264 (1997) 675–691.
18.
On this history, see: Bohdan R. Bociurkiw, The Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church and the Soviet State (1939–1950), (Toronto and Edmonton: CIUS Press, 1996).
19.
For statistics, see Bociurkiw (n. 18), passim.
20.
“Pseudo-council,” because not a single Greek Catholic bishop participated in it (all had been incarcerated prior to the council after they refused to cooperate with the secret police), and the priests were brought to the council by force by the NKVD.
21.
For examples, see: Grigorij Protopopov, “Cattolici in Ucraina,” in Aleksej Judin and Grigorij Protopopov, Cattolici in Russia e Ucraina, (Milano: Casa di Matriona, 1992), pp. 135–261, here: 177–188.
22.
The second, much smaller one being the Council of Churches of Evangelical Christians-Baptists (so-called initsiativniki), see, e.g.: Walter Sawatsky, Soviet Evangelicals since World War II (Scottdale PA: Herald Press, 1981).
23.
To the Light of Resurrection through the Thorns of Catacombs. The Underground Activity and Reemergence of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, Svitlana Hurkina and Andriy Mykhaleyko, eds. (L’viv: Ukrainian Catholic University Press, 2014).
24.
The publication that marked the beginning of the open discussion of Greek Catholics in the Soviet press was G. Rožnov, “Ėto my, Gospodi!” Ogonёk 38 (1989).
25.
For a helpful overview of the ecumenical activity of Cardinal Husar, see: Andrii Mykhaleyko, “Blazhennishij Lubomyr Huzar pro yednist’ khrystians’kykh tserkov v Ukraini,” http://risu.org.ua/ua/bp/theologia/ukrainian/40798/ (Accessed 25/12/2015). See also: A. Mykhaleyko a.o. (eds.), Einheit: Auftrag und Erbe. Anthologie von Texten der Ukrainischen Grie chisch-Katholischen Kirche zu Fragen der Kircheneinheit mit Kommentar (L’viv 2012).
26.
Cf. Galadza, “Eastern Catholic Churches,” 295.
27.
See the correspondence between Sheptytsky and his Russian protégé in Rome, Leonid Feodorov (later, exarch of Russian Greek Catholics), in the years 1907–1911, in: Mytropolyt Andrei Šeptyts’kyi i hreko-katolyky v Rosii. Kn. 1: 1899–1917, Yury P. Avvakumov and Oksana Haiova, eds., (L’viv: Ukrainian Catholic University Press, 2004), esp. 162–164, 315, 487.
28.
In Huntington’s “clash of civilizations,” Western Christianity and the Orthodox Churches belong to rival civilizations: one Western and the other Orthodox. The map of Ukraine which draws a thick civilizational fault line across the territory of Ukraine has become notorious. See Samuel Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order (New York: Simon & Shuster, 1996); cf. Peter McMylor and Maria Vorozhishcheva, “Sociology and Eastern Christianity,” in The Blackwell Companion to Eastern Christianity, 475–478.
29.
Barbara Skinner, The Western Front of Orthodoxy of the Eastern Church. Uniate and Orthodox Conflict in 18th-century Poland, Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia (DeKalb: Northern Illinois University Press, 2009), 42.
30.
For a useful overview of the history of the conflict over the two parallel hierarchical structures in Ruthenia in the early seventeenth century, see: Serhii Plokhy, The Cossacks and Religion in Early Modern Ukraine (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), 100–133.
31.
Anna Veronika Wendland offers an excellent account of the Russophile movement in Galicia in Russophilen in Galizien. Ukrainische Konservative zwischen Österreich und Rußland 1848–1915 (Wien: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2001).
32.
Cf. Mykhaleyko, op. cit. (n. 25).
33.
The official website of the All-Ukrainian Council of Churches and Religious Organizations: http://vrciro.org.ua/ua/ (Accessed 12/30/2015).
34.
These annexations undoubtedly served as models for the liquidation of 1946.
35.
On the difficult relations of Metropolitan Andrei Sheptytsky with the Polish governing elite, see: Liliana Hentosh, Mytropolyt Sheptytsky 1923–1939. Vyprobuvannia idealiv (L’viv: VNTL-Klassika, 2015), esp. 53–109.
36.
See, e.g.: John-Paul Himka, Religion and Nationality in Western Ukraine. The Greek Catholic Church and the Ruthenian National Movement in Galicia, 1867–1900 (Montreal & Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1999); and Wendland, op.cit. (as in n. 32).
37.
For an overview, see: Hentosh, op. cit. (n. 36), 131–210.
38.
This was a re-opening of the Theological Academy in L’viv, originally founded by Metropolitan Andrei Sheptytsky in 1929 and shut down by the Soviets in 1939.
39.
On the inauguration and the idea of a Ukrainian Catholic University, see the collection of papers: Identychnist’ i misiia Ukrains’koho Katolyts’koho Universytetu. Dopovidi, promovy i dyskusii inauguraciinykh urochistostei 25–29 chervnia 2002 roku, Uliana Holovach et al., eds. (L’viv, 2003).
40.
Ukrainian Catholic University. Rector’s Report 2013–2014. Witness, Serve, Communicate [L’viv, 2015].
41.
For a useful overview of recent Ukrainian Greek Catholic theology, see: Oleh Hirnyk, “U poshukakh modeli postkonfesiinoi refleksii: Bohoslovs’kyj avanhard,” in Naukovi zapysky Ukrains’koho katolyts’koho universytetu 5 (2015) 433–462.
42.
See Lubomyr Husar’s addresses on the Maidan on Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_jyYYQdsDY and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9x_NH02CYX8 (Accessed 25/12/2015).
43.
For the English text see http://ucu.edu.ua/eng/news/1720 (Accessed 20/12/2015).
44.
Among the many related materials available on the internet, see: Yaroslav Hrytsak, “Agent Zakhodu. Vystup na panykhidi v Ukrains’komu Universyteti 21 liutoho 2014 roku,” http://zaxid.net/news/showNews.do?aent_zahodu&objectId=1303081 (Accessed 30/12/2015).
45.
For the text of the letter, see http://ipress.ua/news/ministr_kultury_pogrozhuie_svyatoslavu_shevchuku_rozignaty_ugkts_38168.html (Accessed 13/09/2015); for the reaction of the Head of the UGCC Svyatoslav Shevchuk, and the expressions of solidarity on behalf of other churches and religious communities in Ukraine, see: Majdan i tserkva. Khronika podij ta ekspertna otsinka, L. Fylypovych and O. Horkusha, eds. (Kyiv: Sammit-Knyha, 2014), 335–344.
46.
Fylypovych and Horkusha, op.cit. (n. 46), 342–343.
47.
See n. 43 above, and Try dorohy. Besidy Blazhennishoho Lubomyra Huzara z zhurnalistamy (L’viv: Drukars’ki kunshty, 2013).
48.
See the links to Major Archbishop Shevchuk’s interviews on http://headugcc.info/category/intervyu and his sermons and addresses: http://headugcc.info/category/dijalnistj (Accessed 20/12/2015); in particular: http://news.ugcc.ua/interview/glava_ugkts_yakshcho_ne_brati_groshey_u_nechesnih_lyudey_hram_buduvatimetsya_dovshe_72453.html (Accessed 25/12/2015); see also his interview with George Weigel “Ukraine Rising”, http://www.nationalreview.com/article/392368/ukraine-rising-george-weigel (Accessed 01/22/2016), and his rejoinder to Metropolitan Hilarion (Alfeyev) in the wake of the latter’s address to the Synod of Bishops in Rome, see note 6 above.
49.
There are numerous interviews, addresses and writings of Bishop Gudziak available on internet. See, in particular, his blog on RISU (Religious Information Service of Ukraine) website: http://risu.org.ua/ua/index/blog/~borysgudziak; and his appearances on Hromadske TV during the Maidan: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQYONcOIYNo and a more recent English-language interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-VNNL6J8Cyw (Accessed 25/12/2015); see also his “Lessons from the MH17 Shootdown”, http://www.kyivpost.com/opinion/op-ed/borys-gudziak-lessons-from-the-mh17-shootdown-393639.html (Accessed 01/22/2016).
50.
Among Marynovych’s representative interviews and writings: http://theukrainians.org/myroslav-marynovych/; and his RISU blog: http://risu.org.ua/ua/index/blog/~Myroslav+Marynovych (Accessed 25/12/2015).
51.
See Fr. Dymyd’s sermons and reflections in: Klymentiia Dymyd and Mykhailo Dymyd, Kaminnia Maidanu (L’viv: Svichado, 2014). His RISU blog: http://risu.org.ua/ua/index/blog/~Dymyd (Accessed 25/12/2015).
52.
Fylypovych and Horkusha, op. cit. (n. 46), p. 469.
53.
Cyril Hovorun, “The Church in the Bloodlands,” First Things (October, 2014), pp. 41–44, here: 42; see also the remarks by Yurii Chornomorets and by Andrii Yurash in: Fylypovych and Horkusha, op. cit. (n. 45), 56, 143–144.
54.
Among George Weigel’s numerous publications, see his “Ukrainian Lessons for the West,” National Review http://www.nationalreview.com/article/392768/ukrainian-lessons-west-george-weigel (Accessed 26/12/2015); and his “The Drama of Ukraine,” First Things http://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2014/01/the-drama-of-ukraine (Accessed 25/12/2015).
The German Bishops’ statement is: Grußbotschaft von Kardinal Reinhard Marx, Vorsitzender der Deutschen Bischofskonferenz, an Seine Seligkeit Großerzbischof Dr. Sviatoslav Shevtshuk und an die Bischofssynode der Ukrainischen Griechisch-Katholischen Kirche in Ivano-Frankivsk am 30. August 2015, s.: http://www.dbk.de/presse/details/?suchbegriff=ukraine&presseid=2875&cHash=9d9399c816decc615972a3acbd27b9c4, and http://www.katholisch.de/aktuelles/aktuelle-artikel/die-ukraine-nicht-allein-lassen See also: http://www.dbk.de/nc/presse/details/?presseid=2751—communique from February 26, 2015 (Accessed 09/26/2015).
55.
For some reflections on the Pope’s silence, see: Myroslav Marynovych, “When Diplomacy Prevails over the Principles of the Faith,” http://risu.org.ua/en/index/expert_thought/open_theme/59079 (Accessed 09/26/2015).
56.
Immanuel Kant, Grundlegung zur Metaphysik der Sitten, in Werke in sechs Bänden, W. Weischedel, ed., Vol. IV (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1998), 59–60; Kant’s Critique of Practical Reason and Other Works on the Theory of Ethics Transl. Th. Kingsmill Abbott (London: Longman, 1909).

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Department of Theology, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN, USA
Yury P. Avvakumov

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University of Sudbury, Sudbury, Ontario, Canada
Andrii Krawchuk
University of Münster, Münster, Germany
Thomas Bremer

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Avvakumov, Y.P. (2016). Ukrainian Greek Catholics, Past and Present. In: Krawchuk, A., Bremer, T. (eds) Churches in the Ukrainian Crisis. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-34144-6_2

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-34144-6_2
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