Danylo Skoropadsky on His Father’s Death

 

 I first learned of Danylo Skoropadsky on a visit to the old Basilian Fathers Museum in Mundare, Alberta; a building which had been erected in 1938 to house the Basilian Press. When the Press moved to a larger premises in Toronto, and Fathers Orest Kupranets Josaphat Jean moved the Basilian Museum in to it. On 28 July 1957, the new Basilian Fathers Museum (which at an earlier state had been christened, by Jean, as the Archbishop Ladyka Museum) was solemnly inaugurated in its new premises. For the occasion, a telegram, which I recently discovered in the Vatican Apostolic Archive, was solicited and received from the Apostolic See.

            On the second floor of the old museum, there was a photograph of Danylo Skoropadsky visiting the Mundare Monastery, in 1938. It was part of his tour across Canada and the United States to promote the Hetmanite movement. The conservative political movement was headed by his father, Pavlo Skoropadsky, who had ruled as Hetman of Ukraine for a few months, in 1918. Pavlo had taken the old Cossack title Hetman and, as the movement promoted an hereditary monarchy, Danylo was accorded the filial title of Hetmanych. For a time, the Sich-Hetmanite Movement gained a certain popularity among diaspora Ukrainians, notably among Greek-Catholics. 

            Hetman Pavlo remained in Berlin while Danylo was given a cosmopolitan education of university as well as learning a trade. Such preparation would help him, as future leader of the international Hetmanite movement, to identify with him supporters and they with him. As a result, Danylo became a very popular among Ukrainians of various political and religious views. With the Second World War about the break out, in August 1939, Danylo was dispatched to London to gain British support, where he teamed up with his father’s emissary, Vladimir de Korostovets.

            The Vatican Archive holds the Archive of the Apostolic Delegation in Great Britain. One of its fascicles is entitled “Ukrainians” and contains correspondence with various Ukrainian clerical and lay representatives, including Skoropadsky and especially Korostovets. Beginning in 1940, they established friendly contacts with the papal representative (apostolic delegate), Archbishop William Godfrey, to whom they gave a “crash-course” on Ukrainians. Although both Orthodox Christians, Skoropadsky and Korostovets admired Catholicism, given its support for their movement and the Church’s anti-communist stance. Having gained his sympathy, Godfrey interceded for them and other Ukrainians before British church and state authorities. 

             De Korostovets introduced Skoropadsky to Godfrey in May 1940, and made repeated visits subsequently. By the end of the war, the Hetmanych had established confidential relations with the papal envoy. On 7 July 1945, he went to see the Apostolic Delegate with Father Mykhailo Horoshko, a Greek-Catholic chaplain with the Canadian Forces, who was stationed in London at the time. Danylo had received tragic news from Germany and was seeking advice and assistance from the papal diplomat. Godfrey, responded with “sympathy and understanding” and advised Skoropadsky to write to head of the Papal Secretariat of State’s Diplomatic Section, Monsignor Domenico Tardini. Five days later, on 12 July, Danylo had composed 2 letters, transcriptions of which I reproduce here:

           

 Your Excellency,

            I hope you will forgive me for troubling you with this letter. Only the deepest anxiety about the fate of my family, or, to be more exact -of its remaining members- is my excuse. His Grace Archbishop W. Godfrey advised me to write to you and I am venturing to do so.

            Several days ago news reached me that my father, Paul Skoropadsky, former Hetman of the Ukraine in 1918, has died in Metten, Deggendorf (near Prattling), Bavaria as a result of wounds. I do not know how he was wounded, I have, however, reason to believe from other sources that it happened during a air-raid on Prattling on or about the 14th of April.

            With him was my second sister, Elisabeth, as well as our old nurse. The latter two, according to the above short message, were also wounded and are still in the hospital in Metten. My sister was apparently so weak that she could not write the letter herself which was therefore written by an unknown Ukrainian to me and forwarded through Belgium probably by a Belgian prisoner of war returning home.

            There is no possibility of getting an exact picture of what has actually happened and in what circumstances my sister Elisabeth is at this moment. I very much fear that she and our old nurse (both of them wounded) are absolutely alone, with no moral support, and probably without any means.

            I only know that my father with Elisabeth and the nurse were on the way from Berlin, through Weimar, to join the rest of my family in Oberstdorf, Bavaria. The latter, comprising my mother, the eldest sister Mary and my brother Peter, an invalid from birth, were staying with Russian friends, the Mordvinoff’s, at “Het-Haus”, 40 Loretto-Strasse, Oberstdorf-Allgäu, Ober-Bayern, Germany. However about them too I have no exact news and I fear that they also are facing great difficulties. I only know that until the end of June when I received indirect news that the members of my family in Oberstdorf were alive, my mother knew nothing of the whereabouts of my father, my sister Elisabeth and our old nurse.

            I would be immeasurably grateful, Your Excellency, if you find it possible that something  should be done for them all through the channels of the Catholic Church to help them in their present position, in the first case my wounded sister and our nurse. I am certain that Elisabeth is anxious to join the rest of the family in Oberstdorf. For both of the  realisation that someone is trying to help them would be of great oral support. The same applies to my mother (she is 66 years old), who has now to face, after having lost my father, all the present hardships alone and without my being able, from this country, to be helpful to her. The moment there is any possibility of establishing direct contact from here by mail and also the possibility of sending money, I will do so, however, for the time being, this is impossible.

            I enclose herewith: A) A letter to my mother and I would be very grateful if it could be conveyed to her. She is without any direct news from me since the beginning of the war. B) A letter to M-me A. de Korostovetz, who is presumably staying also in Oberstdorf, if not, her whereabouts should be known by my mother. […]

            I am very much worried about the present discussion on the status of people like my family who are stateless. Their future seems very doubtful. Any transfer to the East would mean for them death or deportation. I would be immeasurably grateful for anything Your Excellency would find it possible to do to allay their anxieties.

 

Dated the same day, 12 July 1945, Danylo enclosed the following letter, written in English, to his mother Alexandra:

 

            Darling Mother,

            I am writing you these lines still under the impression of the first shock on receiving the news about father a couple of days ago. How terrible all this is, especially as it was only a few days before the cessation of hostilities! I don’t know whether you have managed to establish contact with Lily and Anna, who both were, according to the message from Dmytro Hryschtchynskyj, on the 12.6.45 in hospital in Metten, near Deggendorf, Bavaria. I hope that our Catholic friends who are forwarding this letter to you will be able to help her and Anna and all of you and to bring you all together in Oberstdorf.

            Personally I have no doubts that the message from Hryschtchynskyj (it was forwarded to me through Belgium) is true. However, I must admit I have never heard his name before. On the other hand his news (that Father died on the 26^thof April in Metten as results of wounds) is corroborated by similar rumours, which reached Ara [Aleksandra de Korostovets] from Switzerland and then Vladimir here. News about Father appeared first in the “Swoboda” 38 Jersey City, N.J., USA. However, there was only a short note saying that Father has died on the 26 of March which was hardly possible. In the meantime I received, as I said, the message from Hryschtchynskyj, which was written on the instruction of Lily. He did not give any further details except that Lily and Anna were still in the hospital in Metten (on June 12^th), furthermore he gave me your address in Obserstdorf, which I knew.

            I have at once initiated steps through Capt. Mattlaw with the British and American Authorities to have, if possible, an official confirmation and also to help Lily and Anna to join you all in Oberstdorf. But this, as always, takes long time.

            To you all I want to say this: we must face it and take it, as so many other people have done in this war. I should have been at my Father’s side to hear his last words and to tell him that I will always continue his work. However God has decided otherwise ad we are helpless to change it.

            Now we must look ahead and make, if possible, plans for the future. I don’t know at all in what circumstances you are. Have you managed to save something or are you without any means? What is the position of Aunt Olga and her family in general? At the first opportunity I could forward you a little money and I know that our people in Canada and U.S.A., with whom I am in contact will not let us down.

            I think the right thing is first that Elisabeth and Anna should join you in Oberstdorf, then to establish contact with me and let me exactly know what is your position as far as money and other means are concerned, and then to decide, whether you should stay for the time being in Oberstdorf (where life is probably cheaper) or should try to go to Iritirzor[?] (I have made all the necessary applications for obtaining of visas along time ago. There were difficulties, but I hope it will be possible to overcome them. In any case P. Kovaliv in Geneva, wrote me You could stay for several months with him, until things in general settle down.

            I hope it will be possible for you to send me a message using the sae channels as I have sending you this letter.

            I have also notified Pavlo Rodzienko about your position. He is with the Forces in Italy. In particular I wrote him about the urgence [sic] of help for Lily. It is not possible to write about everything in this letter as space is short and it must be forwarded in the morning. Only a couple of words about Vladimir and myself. We both are alright and are working hard to help you all. Also we don’t forget our friends, fellow countrymen elsewhere.

            I am working in my factory and am preparing quite well. Michael Hethman is as helpful as always. Everybody in the New World is very anxious about all of you.

            Personally I am not married yet, but am in love with the same woman of whom I wrote to you and Father a long time ago. She has helped me to go through many difficult times during the last years. The question of marriage is still open, and will depend, dear Mother, on your word an advice and also on what were the ideas of Father on this matter. I will write you about all this at some later date, as now the question of having you all together, in safety and warmth, is more urgent.

            God bless you all! Kisses to all of you! My love to Aunt Olga and all her family and do not get downhearted, as we all think of you and are working for you.

            Yours Danylo

            P.S. Vladimir is sending his love to Ara and to all of you. D.

            P.S. I have received a letter yesterday from Olenka’s father in law and we are going to try to find him in Würzburg or elsewhere. Also her husband until last night I did not know his name. D.

 The handwritten letters to Tardini and his mother remain in the Archive of the Apostolic Delegation. Further research is required to determine the reason they were never forwarded to Rome. Likely, Godfrey sent a summary to his superior, who perhaps indicated that the communications could not be forwarded. Godfrey was extremely zealous in another matter: the rescue of Gertrud of Habsburg-Lothringen and her children Maximillian and Claudia. They arrived safely in Paris, Dublin, and London, accompanied by Vladimir de Korostovets’s wife Aleksandra (Ara).

 

Ara de Korostovetz

            Danylo Skoropadsky continued to have close relations with Ukrainian Greek-Catholics in Britain until his untimely death, eleven years later. Below are a list of some events which I have come upon in my research:

            On 15 January 1946, Skoropadsky introduced Father Vasyl Kushnir to the Apostolic Delegation. As President of the Canadian Ukrainian Committee, he had “come to Europe to study the position of the Ukrainian Displaced Persons on the Continent.” Kushnir was instrumental in repatriating Ukrainian refugees from DP camps in Germany to Canada and USA.

            On 27 April 1947, together with Ara and Vladimir de Korostovetz, he attended a Divine Liturgy at the 218 Sussex Gardens celebrated by Canadian Greek-Catholic missionary, Father Josaphat Jean. After the Liturgy, Jean held the inaugural meeting of Saint Theodore of Canterbury Greek-Catholic Parish. These Orthodox notables took part and pledged their support to help acquire a building for the fledgling congregation.  

On 17 January 1948, Father Jean sent Skoropadsky and de Korostovets to lobby the Archbishop of Westminster, Cardinal Griffin, for a church building in London. Following that meeting, Griffin became more energetic in helping to look for a suitable structure. The Orthodox leaders continued to actively liaise until a church was found.

            Skoropadsky became one of the founders of the Association of Ukrainians in Great Britain (AUGB) in January 1946.  After a rift occurred in the organization, in 1949, he accepted the titular headship of AUGB and sought to bridge all divisions in the Ukrainian community. Rather than acting as a partisan politician, Skoropadsky was content to be a figure of unity among various parties, in imitation of the role of the British Monarchy.

            Vladimir and Ara Korostovets participated in a pilgrimage to Rome for the papal Holy Year of 1950. Ara was an iconographer and donated an icon of the Madonna of Hoshiv (a western Ukrainian shrine) to Pope Pius XII, for which she received a telegram from the papal Secretariat of State. In 1953, Ara completed the iconostasis of the Belarusian Catholic Mission begun by another iconographer.

In August 1953, Hetmanych Danylo thanked Archbishop Ivan Buchko for his work on behalf of all Ukrainians, during an AUGB reception for the Archbishop, at 49 Linden Gardens. In February 1954, Skoropadsky made sure to have the head of the Greek-Catholic Church in Britain, Monsignor Aleksander Malynovsky, next to him at the head table, during a banquet held for Danylo’s fiftieth birthday.

In 1956, Skoropadsky organized an 11,000 strong Polish-Ukrainian protest to Soviet dictator Nikita Khrushchev’s visit to Britain. Some have speculated that, in revenge, Khrushchev ordered his assassination the following year; the first of a series of poisonings of Ukrainian émigré leaders which, in 1961, were shown to have been ordered by the dictator. Monsignor Malynovsky had the unenviable task of representing the UGCC at Skoropadsky funeral, at the end of February 1957.

Only three months later, in May 1957, Archbishop Godfrey accepted the nomination as the first Apostolic Exarch for Greek-Catholics in Britain. He had been offered the post because he had succeeded Cardinal Griffin, who had already accepted the appointment in 1955, but died before the exarchate could be established. The succession was fortuitous for Ukrainians, since Griffin had been rather lukewarm to their cause whereas, thanks in large measure to his friendship with Skoropadsky and Korostovets, Godfrey was extremely well prepared to assume spiritual leadership over Ukrainian Catholics, whose national and religious causes he sympathized with. 

As yet in a pre-ecumenical period, Skoropadsky and the de Korostovets’s forged solidarity among Ukrainians of different denominations and factions, working to breakdown down prejudices and establish close cooperation, for the prosperity of the local hromada and the benefit of the Ukrainian nation spread across five continents.

General Pavlo Shandruk to Pope Pius XII

Shandruk in Polish uniform

 Your Holiness! 

            On the solemn day, for the whole world of 80th Birthday Jubilee of Your Holiness,

On behalf of 20,000 soldiers of the 1st Ukrainian Division of the Ukrainian National Army and tens of thousands of their relations, I bend my knee in reverence with deepest gratitude before Your Holiness for having saved those soldiers from certain death.

Those soldiers, and thousands of others of that Division who perished at [the Battle of] Brody were the finest sons of the Ukrainian Nation.

They joined the 1st Ukrainian Division to arm themselves in the hope that, at the opportune moment, they would drive out the old enemy of our beautiful yet somehow unfortunate Ukrainian homeland. And 90% were the flower of the Ukrainian intelligentsia.

 Red Moscow [The Communist Kremlin] demanded their repatriation and the Western Allies, ignorant of the Ukrainian people’s struggle for freedom and independence, were on the verge of handing them over.

At that moment, the one and only hope for us all was the profound faith that only the intervention of Your Holiness could rescue all of those brave patriots. It was with this hope that I, along with delegations from those very soldiers, approached our beloved Prince of the Church, Archbishop Ivan [Buchko], to plead with Your Holiness for help and deliverance.

Your Holiness,

as the Great Patron and Protector of all who are sorrowful and oppressed, You did not refuse His Excellency Archbishop Ivan. We were all saved by the Apostolic See of Your Holiness. And I, their commander, prostrate in filial humility before the Greatest, Worthiest, and Holiest Figure of Your Holiness, we have the greatest honour and good fortune on the day of the 80th jubilee of Your Holiness, to beg the Merciful Saviour and His Most Holy Mother, to bestow endless gifts upon Your Holiness, long life and excellent health for the good of all humanity. All of us without exception will always offer our humble prayers for Your Holiness. We beseech Your Holiness for Your Apostolic Care and intercession before the Throne of the Most High on behalf of our poor humiliated Nation. 

            Prostrate in profoundest respect and endless gratitude          

                        Pavlo Shandruk

Lieutenant-General

Ex-commander of the Ukrainian National Army

May 1956 Anno Domini

 

Documentation from the reign of Pius XII (1939–1958) was opened to scholars in March 2020. Shortly after this, I discovered an Italian translation of the above letter, made by Archbishop Ivan Buchko, in the Archive of the Congregation for the Eastern Churches. The original letter, written in Ukrainian, was only discovered last month in the Vatican Apostolic Archive.

            Finally, scholars will be able to clarify the role played by the Apostolic/Holy See, through its various officials and representatives, in rescuing the Ukrainian Division from being repatriated to the Soviet Union, as demanded by Joseph Stalin. Several books and many articles have been written on the Division but the role of the Pope and his Curia have hitherto been shadowed in mystery and innuendo, since the relative source documents were not accessible. My friend, Professor Myroslav Shkandrij, will touch on this question in his upcoming book on this controversial topic. 

Buhcko visits the Division 1946

          Bishop Buchko brought the desiderata of Ukrainians refugees to the Pope directly and via his Roman Curia, especially through the Congregation which was then called Pro Ecclesia Orientali (today it is Congregation of the Eastern Churches), headed by the indomitable Cardinal Eugène Tisserant. The refugees included both Catholic and Orthodox Christians, and the Apostolic See assisted all of them without discrimination. Among these was the future Metropolitan Ilarion Ohienko, who requested help with research in Switzerland. Buchko asked Tisserant to intervene and the latter obtained access for Ohienko to the University of Fribourg. In arranging this, Tisserant wrote to the Nuncio in Switzerland, in June 1946: “It is the wish of Holy Father that the Oriental Congregation also takes an interest in the material and moral wellbeing of the Orthodox Bishops, in seeking to help them and to assist them with all their just requests.”

In the Spring of 1945, Bishop Buchko wrote to the Pope, to Cardinal Tisserant, and to Monsignors Montini and Tardini of the Papal Secretariat of State. As a Frenchman in Italy who had made his sympathies clear during the War, Tisserant was highly respected by the victors. He lobbied his Allied political and military contacts and the Papal Secretariat of State, which in turn lobbied Allied authorities all over Europe not to forcibly repatriate Ukrainians to the Soviet Union. The Division was only one among several groups in danger of repatriation. Tisserant also brought the Ukrainians’ appeals to the Pope in an audience of 14 and 28 July 1945 and on subsequent occasions.

On 30 September 1955, a general letter of homage was sent to the Pope by the Association of ex-members of the Division. On 15 June 1956, Buchko entrusted Shandruk’s private letter to Cardinal Tisserant, who sent it to the Pope via the Secretariat of State. At the time, the ex-general was residing in Trenton, Ohio, as indicated on Buchko’s Italian translation of the letter (where he substituted “Trenton” for  “травень” (May) 1956. Buchko also airbrushed himself out and substituted the passages referring to himself with thanks to the Oriental Congregation. Although Shandruk had not made that reference in his original letter, Buchko was aware that, without Cardinal Tisserant’s dogged perseverance (as evidenced by internal notes between Tisserant and his own officials), the papal Secretariat of State would not have intervened so vigorously for the Ukrainian prisoners and refugees. In response, the Pope ordered his underlings to thank the old General and to assure him of the Pope’s enduring concern for the “severely tried” Ukrainian people.

Shandruk in UNR uniform

            
General Shandruk was an Orthodox Christian from Volyn. In the First World War he served as a officer in the Russian Army and later in the army of the Ukrainian National Republic. After the war he continued his association with the UNR in Exile. In 1936, he joined the Polish Army and fought to defend the Second Republic against the German Invasion of September 1939 (for which he was posthumously decorated by the Polish Government-in-Exile, in 1965.) In February 1945, he was appointed commander of  a Ukrainian National Army and was dispatched to Austria to organize the former Galicia Division, for that purpose. On 8 May 1945, he surrendered the Ukrainian Army to the British and American Allies. There has been talk of the intervention of Polish General Anders, but it is clear that Shandruk attributed the salvation of his men, at the most critical moment, to the intervention of the Pope. 

Shandruk mentioned the papal intervention on p. 291 of his 1959 book Arms of Valor.

"Conciliabolo" : Rome and the 1946 Lviv Pseudo-Synod

Today marks the 75^thanniversary of the Lviv pseudo-sobor, which took place from 8–10 March 1946. In the past 25 years, few English works have revealed new information in its regard. Based on recently declassified Vatican archival sources, this article seeks to make a modest contribution by revealing what, when, and how the Apostolic See of Rome learned of facts leading up to and resulting from that event.

            During the Soviet occupation of eastern Poland (Western Ukraine) 1939–1941, Stalin fell back on old Tsarist plans to suppress the Greek-Catholic Churches. But attempts to entice clergy to defect floundered on the moral authority enjoyed by Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytsky. When the Red Army returned to Lviv in July 1944, the Metropolitan was already declining, and died within four months, on 1 November. With Sheptytsky out of the way, the NKVD operation was given the go ahead.    

In the spring of 1945, as the Second World War was coming to an end, an Iron Curtain descended upon the eastern half of Europe. On the Old Continent, the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church (UGCC) found itself subject to atheist Communist rule in the east, and in the west, its clergy and faithful displaced across hundreds of refugee camps. In this moment, two projects were set in motion: the first, led by refugee Bishop Ivan Buchko though Pope Pius XII and the Vatican Curia, to raise the agonizing UGCC from the ashes of destruction; the second, concocted by Joseph Stalin and his henchmen, to destroy the Church once and for all.

 

Vatican Information System

            By the twentieth century, the Roman Curia had adopted a multi-tiered system of gleaning information from local Churches: The first tier was the apostolic nuncio (or apostolic delegate for countries that did not have diplomatic relations with the Holy See). The nuncio/delegate or his deputy sent regular reports to the papal Secretariat of State, the central office which acted as moderator of all the curial departments. The State Secretariat had a section for internal church-related matters, and also a foreign office for matters pertaining to political and diplomatic affairs. If an issue pertained to the competency of a specific curial department (such as the Congregation for the Eastern Church), then the nuncio/delegate sent his report there. The second tier of information came from local clergy: first the diocesan bishop/eparch and the hierarchs of province or country. Trusted informers also included religious superiors, especially the Jesuit provincial, and local clergy with particular knowledge or expertise in various questions. The third tier was information from diplomatic and civil authorities, such as an ambassador to the Holy See.

            During the Second World War, this system partially broke down, as communications became difficult and habitual channels were cut off. With the closure of the nunciature of Warsaw, in September 1939, information had to be sought after from the nunciatures in Czechoslovakia, Hungary, and Romania. Catholic prelates from Allied countries also used their political and military contacts to keep the Pope and his Roman Curia informed. Among the most important liaisons in the Allied countries were the apostolic delegates in London and Washington D.C., William Godfrey and Amletto Cicognani. The Holy See approached ambassadors of countries that had relations with the Soviet Union for information regarding Soviet occupation zone. For countries under Axis control, it used the Nunciature to Italy or Berlin. Military chaplains, such as the Italian military expedition that to the USSR in 1941, also sent reports. Among these were UGCC priest-students in Rome, such as Vasyl Vavryk, Meletiy Voinar, Petro Diachyshyn, and Volodymyr Hrabets, recruited by the Italian military via Yevhen Onatsky, for their knowledge of Ukrainian and other Slavic languages.

 

From the Diplomatic Service 

The Vatican first heard of Metropolitan Sheptytsky’s death via the Polish Ambassador to the Holy See, Casimir Papée, and announced it in the newspaper L’Osservatore Romano on 14 and 15 November 1944. The news of the hierarchy’s arrest (on 11 April) also came from Polish diplomats. On 15 June 1945, the Polish ambassador in Washington D.C. informed the apostolic delegation that Metropolitan Slipyi and the other bishops had been arrested. Already at that time, they believed that it was apparent that the Soviets were aiming to destroy the Uniate Church by replacing it with Russian Orthodoxy. (The Government-in-Exile had already warned the Vatican of the dangers to millions of Catholics behind the Curzon Line, following the Yalta Conference, when Molotov had commented that the Soviets would not tolerate Catholics, only Orthodox.) On 18 June, Apostolic Delegate Amletto Cicognani passed this information to Monsignor Tardini, head of the papal Foreign ministry, who informed the Pope on 6 July. 

 

From Ukrainian Clergy 

Details of Sheptytsky’s funeral and the enthronement of his successor were dispatched by Metropolitan Yosyf Slipyi on 19 November 1944, but did not reach Rome until 6 March 1945. Cardinal Tisserant, the head of the Pope’s Eastern-Churches department, brought Slipyi’s letter to Pius XII, who ordered that the account be published in L’Osservatore Romano.

From his Roman exile, Sheptytsky’s auxiliary bishop, Ivan Buchko, became a focal point for Ukrainian exiles and organizations. Pius XII appointed him as apostolic visitor for UGCC throughout western Europe, and Buchko began to lobby for material and pastoral aid for tens of thousands of his displaced countrymen. He also began to lay the groundwork for the creation of a full global hierarchy, to make up for those suppressed in the homeland.

            Bishop Buchko began to receive news from the Ukrainian underground, via European contacts, of the preparations for schism taking place in Soviet Ukraine. 

On 27 March 1945 he informed the Secretariat of State that his compatriots in America reported that 38 priests in Galicia (Western Ukraine) had been shot and 145 priests had been “invited” to become Orthodox or face deportation. On 1 July, he received a letter from Father Gabriel Kostelnyk’s surviving sons, Iriney and Zenon (interned at Bellaria-Rimini) confirming that, in 1941, the NKVD had already tried to get their father to lead a movement to unite UGCC with the Russian Orthodox Church. Buchko communicated this to Cardinal Tisserant on 30 July.

In July 1945, an eyewitness, Father Bronisław Kreuza (Tadeusz Rzewuski), arrived in Rome. He submitting a long and extremely detailed report to the Oriental Congregation, chronicling the events that occurred in Lviv from the summer of 1944 until his departure on 15 June 1945. These included: the death of Metropolitan Andrey, the arrest of the bishops and principal clergy, a shrewd analysis of Kostelnyks background and character, attempts by Fathers Klymentiy Sheptytsky and Yosyf Kladochny to dialogue with Kostelnyk. A Capitular Vicar, Canon Mykola Galant, had been duly elected within the remaining members of the Lviv Chapter of Canons but was sone arrested and a clandestine vicar general [Redemptorist Father Joseph de Vocht] was secretly governing the Lviv Archeparchy. Father Klymentiy played the leading role in public and dispatched Rzewuski-Kreuza to Rome to inform the Curia of what was taking place. On 11 August, he was permitted to recount some of the story in an audience with Pope Pius XII.

On 14 August, a Sister Servant of Mary Immaculate in Lviv wrote to her superiors in Rome of Kostelnyk’s activities. Bishop Buchko forwarded an Italian translation of the letter to the Vatican. On 9 September 1945, he received details of the violence of the Initiative Group’s campaign from Father Volodymyr Prokopiv of the Przemyśl Eparchy (who would be arrested and deported to USSR in October). On 22 September, Buchko forwarded the information to the Oriental Congregation: Mykhailo Melnyk, Vicar General for the Przemyśl Eparchy in Soviet territory, was had the reputation of being a good preacher and theology professor; Antoniy Pelvetsky, who had been Buchko’s seminarian in Lviv, was deemed intellectually mediocre; and Kostelnyk, who was notorious to the Apostolic See, was known for his anti-Roman and anti-celibacy publications. Before the Second World War, Kostelnyk became involved with mysticism and false visionaries. He was also reported to have lost control of his behaviour and have become an alcoholic due to pressure from the NKVD and the murder of his son Bohdan, at their hands.  Buchko had also been informed that there were Russian Orthodox bishops working as agents of the NKVD.

Bishop Buchko also submitted Italian translations of 5 documents: the first two were signed by the members of the Initiative Group; the first, dated 28 May, informed the clergy that the government was placing the Group in charge of UGCC to prepare a merger with Russian Orthodoxy; the second, dated 16 June, was a request to Soviet officials to sanction their plans; a third document was the reply of the Council of People’s Commissars of the Ukrainian USSR, approving their work; and a fourth was the protest against the activities of the Group, addressed to Molotov, signed by the Metropolitan Chapter and faithful priests. Buchko had received the documents from the Ukrainian Information Service in Munich, which had obtained them via the Ukrainian underground or, as he guessed, via Bishop Kotsylovsky. Cardinal Tisserant forwarded the report and translations to the Secretariat of State on 18 October. 

On 5 November 1945, the spiritual director of the Przemyśl seminary, Father Mykola Denko, took advantage of a courier leaving for Czechoslovakia to pen an overview of the situation to Bishop Buchko, as the former was unaware of what was known beyond of the Iron Curtain. He wrote of the arrest of Bishop Kotsylovsky, of NVKD tortures, and the death of many priests. Some had accepted Orthodoxy since they lacked the courage to endure deportation, imprisonment, and torture. Some clergy and faithful from that eparchy that sought protection from the Latin bishops but had been turned away. Writing from Frankfurt on 6 December, Basilian Father Stefan Reshetylo wrote of the arrests in the Przemyśl Eparchy and confirmed the apostasy of the members of the Initiative Group. Buchko submitted this letter to the Oriental Congregation on 14 January 1946.

At the end of December 1945, a similar report was written by a professor of the same seminary, Father Volodymyr Holynsky. He reported that Mykola Galant, Capitular Vicar of Lviv, was dead, and that Canon Kunytsky was dying. Metropolitan Andrey’s old entourage, For the time being, Fathers Klymentiy, Kladochny and Kotiv were still living at Saint George’s Palace. (This report did not reach the Rome until June 1946). In April 1946, a letter was received from Khomyshyn’s secretary, Father Sudak, who had escaped the USSR and was hiding in Warsaw, furnishing details of Khomyshyn’s arrest.

 

Papal Encyclical

In February 1945, Patriarch Sergei of Moscow died and was succeeded by Metropolitan Alexei. On the occasion of his election, an appeal to Greek-Catholics to break with Rome, bearing the new patriarch’s name, was distributed in Soviet Ukraine. The appeal also accused the Vatican of “arming the faithful against all peace-loving people and leading them in the opposite direction, against the whole world.”

A copy of this appeal reached Rome in the summer, with the arrival of Father Rzewuski-Kreuza. Bishop Buchko translated it into Italian on 6 September and it was sent to Monsignor Tardini on 17 September. A translation a booklet against the Papacy, recently published by Kostelnyk, was also sent to the State Secretariat on 12 December. These documents were further evidence that the Soviets were preparing to suppress the UGCC. 

Since the 950^th anniversary of the Union of Brest was approaching, Buchko wrote to Cardinal Tisserant, asking for a message of encouragement for the persecuted Church. Cardinal Tisserant decided on a papal encyclical and received the go-ahead from Pius XII during an audience of 27 October 1945. This solemn commemoration was to be used simultaneously as a protest against the persecution of the UGCC. 

The encyclical’s text was prepared by Jesuit Father Emil Herman, a professor of the Pontifical Oriental Institute and adviser of the Oriental Congregation. It was divided into three parts: a history of the Union, its positive results, the tragic contemporary situation. The first part contains strong praise of the late Metropolitan Sheptytsky (reworked from texts which Tisserant had previously proposed to the State Secretariat for a letter on Kyr Andrey’s anniversary). And the final section included a thunderous condemnation of Alexei’s enticements to schism. The papal message encouraged fidelity but foresaw martyrdom.

On 22 January 1946, the Oriental Congregation submitted the final draft of the encyclical to the Internal Affairs section of the Secretariat of State. In a cover letter, Tisserant explained to Monsignor Montini that official Latin translation had been done by the Jesuit General Curia and reviewed by Herman. Since the document concerned the UGCC, the Congregation had decided to use Ukrainian versions of the names of people and places, reviewed by Bishop Buchko.The encyclical Orientales omnes Ecclesias, bore the date 23 December 1945, the anniversary of the Union, but it was actually published on 20 January 1946.

The immediate reactions to the encyclical were diverse. Ukrainian Catholic were overjoyed by papal solidarity. Buchko thanked Tisserant and asked for a group audience with the Pope, so that the Ukrainian community in Rome could pay him their homage. On 3 April, Father Emanuïl Korduba, head chaplain of the 9,000 Ukrainian soldiers of the Ukrainian (formerly Galicia) Division, interned as POWs in Rimini, wrote thanking thanked the Pope for the encyclical which “condemned the heretical summons to schism.” For some reason, this letter was not shown to the Pope until October 1946, at which time Pius XII was recorded to have said: “it’s a beautiful letter.” 

 Poles complained that the encyclical’s proper names were not the Polish version. A telling critique came from Paris, when the text of the encyclical was published in La Croix and Études. On 11 February 1946, Dominican Father (Archimandrite) Christophe-Jean Dumont complained that certain “unilateral” passages of the document had offended the Russian Orthodox and even Russian Catholics. Dumont, who served a s superior of a mission to Russian émigrés, expressed concern for possible tensions between the two religious denominations. Like other missionaries, he had been encouraged to understand and even absorb the mentality and culture of his flock. As a result, he had acquired a Russian reading of history, which looked upon Ruthenians (Ukrainians, Belarusians, Rusyns) as Russians who had strayed from the Mother Ship. In this vein, Dumont commented that, Although it was unfortunate that the Soviet state had intervened, yet, “could this not be a solution to the prickly Ruthenian question.” Dumont had proposed to Yves Congar that he allude to this in Témoignage Chrétien. (At the height of Vatican Ostpolitik, in July 1963, Dumont would be dispatched to Moscow to offer felicitations for Patriarch Alexei's episcopal jubilee).

 

Synodal Preparations

It appears as if Father Holynsky’s report, written at the end of December 1945, was the first to specifically mention that a synod was being prepared by the Initiative group (although this information did not reach Rome until three months after that event had taken place).  

On 6 January 1946, the Vicar General of the Basilian Order, Father Dionisiy Holovetsky, passed on a report from Father Mykhailo Ivanyshyn, who had come from Lviv to Warsaw at the end of 1945. The same month, an undated seven-page report was submitted by Redemptorist Father Maurice Van de Maele through Monsignor Forni of the Prague Nunciature. It recounted the Soviet religious policy from the moment of their occupation. At first, Roman and Greek Catholic Churches were encouraged, to keep the locals calm and content. Then, in 1945, when victory was in sight, the policy of one state – one religion was announced. Van den Maele noted that none of the monastics had yet given in but that many secular priests had succumbed to save their families from deportation to Siberia. “A great synod” was already being talked about and “the nationalist youth” (many of which were the children of the clergy hiding in the forests) had threatened to kill Kostelnyk if he carried out the planned schism.

In February, Tardini informed Tisserant that Forni had also received another report from a Basilian, who claimed that 90% of priests that had gone into schism. Tisserant replied that this did not correspond with the information received from Van de Maele, and asked for the name of the source. Forni replied that the information had come from Father Sebastian Sabol in Trebišov, Czechoslovakia, a few kilometres from the Soviet border. Forni noted that Sabol was in constant contact with his compatriots and was greatly trusted by Bishop Pavel Gojdič of Prjaševo (Prešov). On 16 May Tardini specified that Sabol confirmed that his information had been accurate but that the percentage of apostate priests had been exaggerated.

Meanwhile, Polish sources continued to send information from behind the Curzon line, regarding preparations for schism. The Basilians in USSR had lost their monasteries and Bishop Kotsylovsky, who had been detained in Rzeszów, had been deported to USSR, presumably to Kyiv to join his imprisoned brother bishops awaiting trial.

Cardinal Tisserant, who appears to have taken little notice of Dumont's angst, went on the offensive by giving a number of interviews to the press regarding the recent papal encyclical. On 28 February, he spoke to the Italian press about the persecution of UGCC in USSR and how clergy and faithful were being forced to accept the state religion, laying some of the blame at the doorstep of the Patriarch of Moscow. From 1–3 March, similar interviews appeared in the English-language press, especially the New York Times. Buchko wrote to Tisserant on 2 April that, although several prominent cardinals, such as Tisserant, de Barros Câmera, and Griffin, had raised their voices against the persecution, the international Catholic press had reported little on Orientales omnes.

 

Reactions to the Pseudo-Sobor

The Lviv pseudo-Sobor took place on 8–10 March 1946, after which the results were announced on Radio Moscow. On 19 March, the nunciature in Cairo wrote that it was bring reported that “the head of Uniates in Lvov had broken with Rome.” On 24 March, the Apostolic Delegate had telegraphed from Washington, asking the Secretariat of State for clarification on: who were Kostelnyk, Melnyk, Pelvetsky that had signed a letter to Stalin declaring the Union abolished; why the Greek-Catholic bishops had not reacted, and if some were dead, as rumoured. Tisserant replied that the signatories were apostates (no longer qualified representatives), and that the UGCC hierarchs had been arrested the previous April. The rumours of Khomyshyn’s death were suspected to be true, but Slipyi’s was not confirmed. 

            The first public response from the Vatican was an article entitled “I greco-cattolici nell’Unione Sovietica” (Greek Catholics in the Soviet Union), published in L’Osservatore Romano on 25–26 March 1946. The piece reported news from Études on Kostelnyk and the pressure on the clergy to commit schism. The text of the Initiative Group’s letter to Soviet officials and appeal to the UGCC clergy (already translated by Buchko in in September 1945) were also included. The article also noted that La Croix had published the faithful clergy’s protest  to the Initiate Group on 20 October 1945.

            On 26 March, the apostolic Delegate in London, William Godfrey, reported that a letter had been issued by Council of Christians and Jews, signed by Socialist leader and politician, Ernest Bevin. The letter expressed concern that the secession of UGCC from Rome had been brought about under pressure, and noted the encyclical Orientales omnes.

            When Ukrainians learned of the fake synod, they began to issue their own protests and statements of solidarity. On 29 March 1946, a telegram was sent to Pius XII, signed by Rev. Dr Basil Kushnir (of a visiting Canadian committee) on behalf of 9,000 soldiers of the Ukrainian Division in Rimini. On 30 March, Bishop Buchko wrote directly to Pius XII. In apocalyptic language, he declared that the devil was attempting to deceive the world into believing that the UGCC had spontaneously broken the Union, although no one was free under Stalin. The bishop renewed his request for an audience for all Ukrainians in Rome, including 30 priests and religious brothers and sisters, representatives of 5,000 Ukrainians in the Polish Corps and the 4 Catholic chaplains from Rimini. In reply, Buchko was told that the Pope appreciated the declarations and would do his best to help the Ukrainians in Italy. However, an audience would not be a good idea, since it would draw attention to them at a time when the USSR was lobbying for their repatriation. 

            On 5 April, Tisserant informed Tardini that there were only 2 apostate priests on the Polish side of the border and that reports of quasi-universal apostasy among the clergy on the Soviet side were exaggerated. Tisserant asked the Secretariat of State to thank Cardinal Hlond and Bishop Sokołowski for the care they had shown to the Greek-Catholics.

On 14 April 1946, the Central Aid Committee of Ukrainians in Germany sent a letter to the Holy See repudiating the pseudo-synod, declaring that the Ukrainian National Republic (a kind of umbrella organization for various political factions) considered it an act of deceit and violence. The letter also noted that bishops of the Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church had issued a condemnation at their synod in Esslingen, Wurttemberg. The hierarchs noted that Orthodoxy would never force conversions and expressed their sincere fraternal compassion and prayers to God shorten the sufferings of the UGCC. To a declaration from the Ukrainian Committee in Berne, Switzerland, Tardini wrote Nuncio Bernardini, on 28 April, that the Holy Father knows of the plight of Ukrainians and had issued Orientales omnes in solidarity with them. The Ukrainian General Council of Liberation also sent a memorandum on the pseudo-sobor to Monsignor Montini on 22 May.

On 12 June, Bishop Buchko reported to Cardinal Tisserant that, Radio Moscow’s announcement of the pseudo-sobor had provoked protests from refugees in Germany. He had received 34 protests signed by thousands of Ukrainian Catholics and Orthodox. Buchko described them as the indestructible voice of the UGCC’s union with the Pope, which those in homeland were prevented from expressing. All of the declarations were in Ukrainian except for one, written in Latin. Buchko had them translated into Italian for the Apostolic See. The bishop noted that, among the signatories were: political representatives including former MPs of the Second Polish Republic, a former senator, members of the League of Ukrainians from German concentration camps, members of the League of university students, and thirteen priests.

On 22 June 1946, these declarations were presented to Pius XII by Bishop Arata. Tisserant’s deputy at the Oriental Congregation. In response, the Pope “blessed persecuted Ukrainian people from his heart.” Arata was instructed to “make these declarations known to the world but cautiously, so as not to harm those in homeland.” Canon Yustyn Hirnyak of Stanyslaviv, representing 122 refugee priests and faithful in Austria, had brought another declaration protesting the “conciliabolo” (imposter council) to Rome and protesting their attachment to the Apostolic See. Cardinal Tisserant presented it to Pius XII on 13 July. 

Finally, on 13 July, Apostolic Delegate Godfrey reported to the papal Secretariat of State on the declarations and accusations against the Church by Radio Moscow. William Godfrey believed that the behaviour of Soviets was destroying the esteem they had won among the Allies during the war. He also noted that, in response to the pseudo-sobor, the Archbishop of Canterbury (head of the Anglican Communion) had issued statement expressing hope that the Soviets would show more tolerance.

 

Aftermath

            A year later, information continued to arrive describing resistance to the “conciliabolo.” In March 1947, a priest who had escaped gave information to Apostolic delegate Cicognani and Cardinal Tisserant asked Bishop Buchko to evaluate it. On 2 May, Buchko noted that it was very different from news he had received from the Ukrainian Information Service. Although he judged such news “incomplete in content” he guessed that the Information Service was the same as the one called “KIRA.” Buchko’s information was that there were entire regions in the Carpathians Mountains where UPA was sheltering faithful priests. In the former Przemyśl Eparchy, priests audibly commemorated the Pope in the liturgical services. The apostate Bishop Melnyk was rumoured to be tacitly consenting, and even supporting those priests who had secretly remained faithful to Rome. In August 1946, the Information Service reported that about half of the priests accepted the sobor, while others preferred deportation to Siberia. Six were killed by UPA as soon as they returned home from the pseudo-sobor. No religious were yet reported to have submitted to Moscow.

Sometime toward the end of 1946, a copy of a letter by Father Kostelnyk, addressed to a priest in his native Bačka region of Yugoslavia, was sent to Bishop Buchko, who translated it into Italian and submitted it to the Oriental Congregation. Dated 15 November 1946 and signed “Gabor,” the letter stated that Kostelnyk was always convinced that the Union with Rome had been the ruin of the UGCC (identifying it with Polish hegemony). He claimed that noting could be done in 1941 without destroying the Church but times had changed in 1945. He suggested that union with the Russian Orthodox Church was “the only way,” proven by fact that 1110 out of 1250 priests had accepted it. (No mention of the assassinated, tortured, or deported).

Kostelnyk believed that the Red Army had saved the western Ukrainians from annihilation at the hands of avenging Poles. Since the UGCC bishops had been accused of collaboration with the Germans, the only way to save the UGCC was to accept the freedoms the Orthodox had won through loyalty to USSR. Kostelnyk declared himself innocent before God and history, and suggested that the Križevci Eparchy follow his lead. He ended with the warning (in ideological language): “Be careful the progress of history does not crush you under its wheels.”           

Kostelnyk had told his friend that he was planning to visit Yugoslavia to help them join Orthodoxy, but first the terrain had to be prepared. On 24 May 1948, the chargé d’affaires of the Belgrade Nunciature, Joseph Hurley, informed Rome that the priests and faithful of the Križevci Eparchy had remained faithful and were preparing to resist Kostelnyk upon his return. But the planned visit never took place. On 24 September 1948, Bishop Buchko informed the Oriental Congregation that Kostelnyk had been assassinated. On 28 September, Monsignor Luigi Poggi informed Monsignor Tardini that Patriarch Alexei had declared that the assassin was a “bourgeois Ukrainian nationalist” acting on orders of the Pope. The lurid accusation might have been designed to lesson papal prestige in countries, such a Italy, were the Communist parties were on the offensive, seeking to take power. Whatever the reason, it was considered sufficient for an official denial, which appeared as an article entitled “Calunniose Perfidie” (Calumnious perfidy), on the front page of the 19 January 1949 issue of L’Osservatore Romano.

UGCC hierarchy 1959

Historians expert on Ukrainian sources, such as those that participated in the recent UCU conference on the Pseudo-Synod, will be able to compare what the Vatican was told to other sources, in order to determine what was accurate and was false. In examining only some of documentation of the Roman Curia of the period, we can already see that the Holy See, far from being disinterested or standing aloof, was very concerned to the fate of the UGCC. Highly influential in this process was Bishop (later Archbishop) Ivan Buchko, whose efforts to preserve the UGCC and Ukrainian diaspora organizations were crowned with great success. This was due to the generous financial and moral support of the Apostolic See, mediated through the intercessions of Cardinal Eugène Tisserant. the Pope continued to publically proclaim solidary for Ukrainians in apostolic letters and encyclicals, and by the creation of bishoprics and metropolitan provinces throughout Europe, the Americas, and Australia. By the time of the his death, in October 1958, Pius XII had established the UGCC hierarchy across 4 continents of the globe.