Saturday, June 9, 1973
La Guardia Airport
It is, indeed, a great blessing of God for a former prisoner of the Soviet Union to find himself in New York City. I have long dreamt of visiting this famous city in the greatest democracy in the world. During my internment in labor camps I had often regretted that this dream had not materialized. My regrets were too hasty. God has His own ways. I lived to see freedom again. I lived to come twice to New York City — the fortress for the defense of human rights.
You who live here have the duty to utilize both your freedom and the world forum available to you for the defense of human rights for all persecuted and discriminated peoples and groups — the Ukrainians among them. Your opportunities for this constitute a portion of the five evangelical talents which you have the responsibility not only to preseve but to multiply.
In my life I have seen and experienced much pain, much sorrow and havoc brought about by two world wars and the chauvinistic designs of political powers in the years between the wars. In this age of sophisticated technology, political, religious, and social injustices have even more serious connotations — the destruction of civilization. Diplomats must talk and seek understandings but they must remember that a surrender of basic principles of justice and human dignity is not an understanding but a capitulation. My people, my Church, and I have experienced the bitter fruits of the negation of basic human rights. I do not wish this same experience upon anyone. I stand in defense of the rights of all. Naturally, since God has made me a member of a Particular Church and a given people, my first duty is the defense of the rights of this Church and this people — the Ukrainian Catholic Church and its faithful. I take this opportunity to point out a fact which is generally unknown or too frequently overlooked — and that is that while other religious groups in the Soviet Union, such as the Baptists and the Jews, suffer discrimination, the Ukrainian Catholics and Orthodox are the groups suffering the greatest injustices. Both these Churches have been denied the right to a legal existence. They do not have a single church open to serve the pastoral needs of their faithful either in the Soviet Union or in their own Ukrainian Republic.
Those for whom it is politically inconvenient for our Church to flourish have called the defense of the rights of our Particular (Pomisna) Church by me and the hierarchs of our Church political and nationalistic moves. This is not so. Our efforts are governed by purely pastoral considerations, by consideration for basic human rights. They are a simple defense to our human dignity. Can spokesmen for the Baptists or the Jews in the Soviet Union who defend the rights of their communities be criticized for their efforts? Indeed they cannot^ And the Mayor of your great city, John Lindsay, gave testimony to this during his recent trip to the Soviet Union when he spoke out in defense of the rights of Soviet Jewry.
The situation of the Ukrainian Catholic Church is most unfortunate because of the policy of rapprochement with Moscow initiated by some groups within the Roman Curia. This policy has caused the Vatican — which might be expected to offer a vigorous defense of the Ukrainian Catholic Church in its homeland — to remain silent. Appeasers seek to ease their consciences by arguing that Christ established ONE CHURCH. The Church is one in dogma but not in form. To put the record straight, the controversy between the Ukrainian Catholics bishops and the Vatican does not involve dogmatic differences in any way. What is at stake is an administrative question. We are living in a very difficult period of church history – perhaps more difficult than ever before in history. But our cause is God’s cause and with God’s help we shall accomplish what we have undertaken to do. We shall win universal recognition that our Ukrainian Church is a Patriarchate!
I am a former prisoner of the Soviet Union. Since my release in 1963, I have resided at the Vatican.
This is my second trip to the United States but only my first visit to your great industrial city.
I come to your from Australia upon my return trip to Rome after having attended the 40th Eucharistic Congress. In the last few months I have travelled 60,000 miles visiting the major cities of Australia and Canada. I have also been in Japan and Formosa. In Canada I visited Ukrainian communities in Vancouver, Edmonton, Winnipeg, and Toronto.
On Saturday, May 12, I arrived in Philadelphia to visit the Ukrainian Catholics in this country. I come to you from Cleveland after having been in Newark, N.J.
I come to your fair city, as I came to the other great American cities in which large communities of Ukrainian Catholics are located to remind Ukrainian Catholics of the unity of their Particular (Pomisna) Church, to encourage you to remain loyal to your rite, your traditions, your Church.
We are living in a period difficult for our Church, perhaps more difficult than ever before in the history of our Church. But our cause is God’s cause and with God’s help we shall accomplish what we have undertaken to do. We shall win the recognition of a Patriarchate for our Ukrainian Church.
A Patriarchate for the Ukrainian Catholic Church is an absolute necessity today. It is essential for the very existence of our Church because:
1. On its native territory this Church has been denied the right for legal existence. It has become the Church of the Modern Catacombs .
2. The faithful of this Church beyond the limits of Ukraine are scattered throughout the world as never before. They live throughout Europe, Canada, the United States, South America, Australia, and even the Far East. This offers the Ukrainian Catholic Church opportunity to survive. It has done so and it has even flourished. Everywhere I went I heard the same music, witnessed the same ritual ceremonies, saw the same church architecture. In these scattered territories we have twenty bishops. All this, however, is only temporary security for in each country this Church is exposed to the impact of the circumstances and culture of the country in which it exists. Such a situation fosters assimilation. Without a unified administration to preserve the original identity of our Church, our Church will perish. Without a Patriarchate our Church has no future.
It is the duty of you who live in this great land of freedom have the duty to utilize this freedom for the good of your Particular Church. This freedom constitutes the five evangelical talents for which responsibility rests upon you not only to preserve but to multiply.
In working toward a patriarchate you in no way challenge the dignity or prestige of the Universal Church. I, myself, have suffered 18 years of imprisonment for my loyalty to the Holy See. Such efforts are only an undertaking to restore the negated rights recognized our Church in 1596 in the Union of Brest when the Ukrainian Church became affiliated with Rome. Unity does not mean uniformity. The good of the Universal Church is best served in preserving unity in the diversity of rites. A patriarchal form of administration is nothing new for Eastern Churches in communion with Rome. It is the accepted form as in the case of the Melkites, Copts and others, yet the largest Eastern Catholic Church has not been recognized this system of administration — the Ukrainian Catholic Church, the Church which constitutes 75% of all Eastern Catholics.
(Translation from French) Summer 1972
