Witness to a Historic Moment
by Olya Henry-Korzachenko (vice-president UCSS Ottawa Brunch)
 

On August 21 of this year I had the wonderful experience of participating in the Divine Liturgy, celebrated by Cardinal Hussar and several hundred bishops and priests, that commemorated the move of Ukrainian Catholic Church headquarters from Lviv to Kyiv. It was a warm and sunny day, perfect for such an historic occasion. The new church, situated on the left bank of the Dnipro River and with a view of the golden domes of Pecherska Lavra on the opposite bank, is not yet complete. Liturgy, therefore, was celebrated outdoors in the plaza next to the skeleton of the immense modern structure that will replace Sviatoho Yura in Lviv as the headquarters of the Ukrainian Catholic Church.

According to the press, approximately 3000 people attended the commemoration, including representatives from the Ukrainian Orthodox Autocephalos and Kyiv Patrirchate. As the faithful sang and prayed, hundreds of demonstrators outside the low walls surrounding the plaza could be heard protesting. They had come at the request of their Russian Orthodox leaders who still have a firm grasp on many people, especially in eastern Ukraine. The Russian Orthodox Church, based in Moscow, continues to own many of the historic churches and monasteries in Ukraine. As they held icons and chanted prayers in Russian, these demonstrators attempted to prevent people from entering the plaza and demanded "death for Hussar and all of his followers". The head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Alexei II, had warned from Moscow that the move to Kyiv would degrade his church's relations with the Vatican and would create social unrest in Ukraine. He even wrote an open letter to Pope Benedict demanding that he forbid the move.

The area around the church was surrounded by police, including the Berkut swat team and there seemed to be almost as many members of the police forces as there were participants in both the Divine Liturgy and the demonstration. Fortunately there were no major incidents and the protesters stayed outside of the walled area, using megaphones and shouting obscenities before disbanding after the Divine Liturgy.

The demonstrations and the opposition to the move to Kyiv are of course politically motivated. Ukrainian Catholics, who make up only 10 percent of the Ukrainian population, are situated primarily in the country's nationalistic and Ukrainian- speaking west and do not have the same strong religious and historic ties to Russia as the eastern part of the country. Also, the Ukrainian diaspora in the West is by and large Ukrainian Catholic and exerts influence through its ongoing links with Ukraine. As the people in eastern Ukraine have more exposure to the Ukrainian Catholic Church, the less tied to Russia they are likely to be. It is no wonder that the Russian Orthodox Church fears what it perceives to be an expansion of the Ukrainian Catholic Church into Kyiv. Historically, the Ukrainian Catholic Church had its headquarters in yiv prior to Catherine the Great's ban which drove it into exile. This return of the Ukrainian Catholic Church to Kyiv is one more indicator that the days of Ukraine being run from Moscow and one state run religion being imposed on all are indeed over.