Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church in the Soviet Union

Hostility toward the so-called "Uniate Church" dates back to the Union of Brest in 1596, when the majority of Orthodox bishops in Ukraine and Belarus (then part of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth) recognized the primacy of the Holy See.

Without any efforts to conceal its intentions, the Soviet regime renewed earlier attempts to liquidate the Union of Brest following its liberation of Western Ukrainian lands in September 1939, prior to which they were occupied by Poland.

On 28 October 1940, despite disapproval even from Orthodox hierarchs, who warned of possible difficulties stemming from planned religious conversions, the Moscow Patriarchate openly declared its desire to liquidate Greek-Catholicism.

By April 1945, Iosyf Stalin approved a 10-point plan – developed by leaders of the Ukrainian Communist Party – which called for the liquidation of the Greek-Catholic Church and the augmentation of Orthodox infrastructures in Ukraine.

During his many private meetings with members of the priesthood, Kostelnyk asserted that the issue of "reunion" would be limited only to a formal subordination to the Russian Orthodox Church; the ability to observe holy days and conduct religious services would be retained without any changes and such an arrangement, given the circumstances, would be in the best interest of the faithful.

The culmination of the "unification" campaign took place at the Synod of Lviv in March 1946, when an assembly of appointed hierarchs "annulled" the Union of Brest (although this 1946 congregation was not convened in accordance with canon law).

Stalin's death in March 1953, the internal struggle for power following his demise, and the so-called de-Stalinization campaign initiated by Nikita Khrushchev all had a significant impact on the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church.

A meeting between the head of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, Mykola Pidhornyi and Pope Paul VI on June 30, 1969, produced no breakthrough regarding the legalization of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church.

The Final Act of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe in Helsinki in August 1975 served as an important step towards the implementation of international monitoring of Human Rights in the USSR, particularly the freedom of religion.

For the underground Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church – the largest banned religious organization in the Soviet Union – the Helsinki Accords initiated the practice of regularly held observational conferences.

In late spring 1978, yet another initiative was undertaken – most likely under the impetus of the Soviet Ukrainian government – to resolve the legalization issue of the UGCC in the form of a "Roman Catholic Church of the Eastern Rite."

The Soviet authorities' concerns regarding the new pope's intentions were confirmed by the publication of a letter (dated 19 March 1979) addressed to Cardinal Josyf Slipyj regarding the Millennium of Ukraine's Christianity, scheduled to be commemorated in 1988.

Simultaneously directing his address at the Soviet government, the pope invoked the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by appealing to the authorities to allow each believer to profess his/her own faith and to participate in the communal life of the Church to which he/she belongs.

The pope's letter to Slipyj not only sent shock waves and anxiety throughout the Vatican's Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity (headed at that time by Cardinal Johannes Willebrands), but also spurred a harsh reaction from Moscow.

The already strained relations between Moscow and the Vatican were exacerbated even further, when later that same year the synod of Ukrainian bishops was once again summoned to Rome where, on 2 December 1980, it adopted a resolution which unanimously declared the Lviv Sobor of 1946 as uncanonical and void.

As a result, Rome immediately informed all of the papal nuncios in those countries where Ukrainian Catholics dwelled that the texts of the resolution did not receive formal approval and were therefore not considered official documents.

He informed a conference of Orthodox bishops that authorities in Ukraine had embarked on a massive propaganda initiative and had taken certain administrative steps to counteract the "nationalist and religious subversive deeds" supported by the Vatican.

One of the reasons behind the publication of the bulletin was the ever-deepening crisis because aging priests who were trained under "normal" circumstances (prior to the Church's destruction) could not be replaced by equally well-trained young clergymen.

In late 1987 – following Iosyp Terelia's relocation to Canada – the Initiative Group's title was changed to the "Committee for the Defense of the Ukrainian Catholic Church" and its leadership was now assumed by the recently released political dissident Ivan Gel.

This led to a planned meeting in Moscow scheduled for 10 June 1988 between cardinals Agostino Casaroli and Johannes Willebrands and a Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church delegation headed by bishops Fylymon Kurchaba and Pavlo Vasylyk.

On 7 February 1989, a UGCC delegation headed by bishop Pavlo Vasylyk departed for Moscow to engage in negotiations at which it demanded the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church's recognition by the USSR's central authorities.

In response to Metropolitan Filaret's assertion that the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church would never attain legal status, on 16 May 1989, 4 bishops and 10 priests of the UGCC submitted a formal appeal to General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev.

At first, the authorities placed administrative sanctions on the parishes but then cancelled such directives hoping to avoid confrontations with parishioners and the local RUKH affiliates, which had already managed to spread their influence on the UAOC.

On 26 November – one week prior to Gorbachev's meeting with Pope John Paul II in Rome – over 100,000 UGCC faithful took part in a demonstration demanding the return of St. George's Cathedral to the Ukrainian Greek-Catholics.

The Apostolic See consistently raised the issue of the rights of Ukrainian Greek-Catholics during its numerous negotiations with the Kremlin – despite minimal reciprocity – ever since Soviet-Vatican relations experienced a thaw beginning in the early 1960s.

In June 1988, the Vatican once again expressed its desire for the UGCC's legalization when a delegation to Moscow headed by Cardinals Casaroli and Willebrands took part in the festivities commemorating the Millennium of the Baptism of Kyivan Rus'.

Furthermore, the Russian Orthodox Church banked on taking advantage of the decades-long discord between the Vatican and the UGCC's émigré activists who were demanding the appointment of a separate patriarch for Ukrainian Greek-Catholics outside Ukraine.

Nevertheless, the Soviet authorities insisted that specific aspects of the legalization process be coordinated between the Vatican, the Kremlin and the Moscow Patriarchate based on the principles of genuine ecumenical dialogue between the Roman Catholic and Russian Orthodox Churches.

Realizing that the outright legalization of the Uniate Church would cause religious unrest in Western Ukraine and would lead to conflict with the Moscow Patriarchate, Gorbachev refused to delegate direct responsibility to the government regarding the settlement of the UGCC question.

Furthermore, there was no talk of returning ecclesiastical structures and property – nationalized by the state – to the UGCC, nor of annulling the Lviv pseudo-Sobor of 1946, nor of a formal rehabilitation of the Church or even any kind of compensation for losses incurred over the decades.