Thursday, September 27, 1973, the Sheraton Hotel in Philadelphia was the site of double- barreled activities centered around the visit of Archbishop Mario Brini, Secretary of the Sacred Congregation for Eastern Churches. While Archbishop Ambrose Senyshyn of the Ukrainian Catholic Archeparchy of Philadelphia was hosting Archbishop Brini at a luncheon, a representation of Ukrainian Catholics of the Philadelphia area demonstrated in front of this same hotel to show the visiting church prelate that he is an unwelcome guest among Eastern Catholics. The demonstrators carried placards reading: “Don’t Bully Our Bishops; Unity in Dogma, Autonomy in Administration; Stop Fragmenting Our Church; We Want Liberation From the Congregation; Unity-Yes! Uniformity-No!; Down With Latinization; Pimen Is Waiting For You; Brini Go Home.”
Archbishop Senyshyn planned to host Archbishop Brini on Monday, October 1. However, on Sunday, September 23, the Philadelphia branch of the Society for a Patriarchal System in the Ukrainian Church announced on its radio program that Brini was an unwelcomed guest in the Philadelphia Ukrainian community and would be greeted as was the retired Prefect of this Congregation Maximillian Cardinal de Furstenberg by mass demonstrators chanting “Brini Go Home.” In an attempt to avoid such a confrontation, Archbishop Senyshyn changed the date of the Vatican prelate’s reception. “The quick switch shows that the Archbishop and his unwelcome guest are on the run but they didn’t get away from us completely. We will keep them running until the rights due our Church are recognized by the Vatican curia,” said a spokesman for the group.
Archbishop Brini is touring the United States visiting the dioceses of Eastern Catholic Churches. He has been in Detroit where he visited the Maronite Catholic diocese. From Philadelphia he went to Pittsburg, Chicago, and New York. Pittsburg and New York were the scenes of unwelcoming demonstrations by the Ukrainian laity against Congregation’s policies.
The Eastern Catholics who have not fallen victim to the process of Latinization of their Church, strongly oppose Archbishop Brini’s tour of their communities. To them in the post-Vatican II era he ‘represents the narrow-minded conservative proponents of the maintenance of the pre-Vatican II system of centralized Vatican government of Eastern Churches imposed on these Churches with the establishment of the Congregation for Eastern Churches of which Brini is now secretary.
The Ukrainian Catholics constitute 75% of all Eastern Catholics in the world. They are particularly wary of Brini’s visit because their Church has suffered virtual “persecution” for over a decade at the hands of the Eastern Congregation. It is the Congregation for Eastern Churches which first denied the right of the Ukrainian bishops to hold a Synod. It is this organ of the Vatican curia which first began to intimidate the Ukrainian bishops in an attempt to convince them to tow the curial line and not support the endeavors and policies of their Major-Archbishop, now Patriarch by acclamation of the faithful of the Ukrainian Catholic Church. Within this span of time the Sacred Congregation for Eastern Churches has had a number of prefects but under them all Archbishop Brini remained the secretary. Under his tenure in this office the constant elements in this Congregation was the “Triple P threat”—his presence, his prejudices, and his policies. Being an alumnus of the Russicum, Brini was indoctrinated by such sentiments as recently expressed by its rector Father P. Mailleu, S.J. (see journal Za Patriarkhat, no. 4(27).
It has been leaked by authoritative Vatican sources that before his death Eugene Cardinal Tisserant, who himself had been secretary of the Congregation for Eastern Churches, said that as long as Archbishop Brini remains a member of this Congregation the Eastern Catholic Churches and especially the Ukrainian Catholic Church have no outlook for the restoration of their rights.
One spokesman for the protesting Ukrainian Catholics said: “We have no desire to receive any representative of that agency of the Vatican curia which has been in the forefront of those who are depriving our Church of its rights as an autonomous Church in union with Rome, making an effort to reduce our episcopate to lackeys of the Roman Church in union with Rome, making an effort demonstrating a profound lack of respect for both the person and the office of the Primate of our Church—Patriarch Joseph—despite his biography of living martyrdom out of loyalty to the Vicar of Christ.” Such convictions are the source of the indignation of the protestors carrying placards reading, “Brini Go Home.”
Department of Public Relations
Society for Patriarchal System
in the Ukrainian Catholic Church
