It is with a sense of dismay and surprise that we, the Ukrainian Catholic bishops in the United States, read in the November 5, 1984 issue of “Newsweek“ a disturbing report on the Ukrainian Catholic Church Church (“The Wrong Rite in the Church of Rome.“) Not only does the Church of Rome acknowledge the legitimacy of the “underground Church in the Soviet Union” as evidenced by the recent appointment of Metropolitan Myroslav Iwah Lubachivsky as successor to Cardinal Josyf Slipyj as Archbishop of Lviv (a See presently in Soviet-controlled Ukraine), but. She also assisted in the liberation from Soviet incarceration one of Ukraine’s most illustrious leaders, the same late Major Archbishop and Metropolitan Slipyj, who in 1963 received one of the more outstanding ovations when he spoke during a session of the Second Vatican Council. While it is true that the Church has told us that we may not call our Major Archbishop “Patriarch” She has never prevented us from working toward this goal. Furthermore, Ukrainian Catholic bishops in Europe still enjoy the long-treasured right of ordaining qualified married men to the priesthood; we in America have not ordained married men since the appearance of the Motu Proprio, “Cum Data Fuerit, “ in 1929, a time when the majority of American Latin Catholics were not ready to accept the idea of a married priesthood. As regards your reference to married men who have been ordained since 1963, we categorically deny that we have received instructions to “suspend them all.“ As a matter offact, we have granted jurisdiction to many of these priests who are working in our dioceses on loan from the European dioceses for which they were ordained.
With every best wish, we are
Sincerely yours,
+ Stephen Sulyk Metropolitan Archbishop of, Philadelphia.
Most Rev. Basil H. Losten Bishop of St. Nicholas in Chicago
Most Rev. Innocent Lotockyj, Bishop of Stamford OSBM
Most Rev. Robert M, Moskal Bishop of St. Josaphat la Parma
