For more information about Martin, go to ☼☼https://gravatar.com/martinoarnold☼☼

For more about Christianity in Ukraine —> ☼☼ Internet Encyclopedia of Ukraine ☼☼

Christians were active in what is today Ukraine long before there was extensive Slavic settlement in the land —> Christianization of Ukraine.

In Kyiv in 988, a Viking lord called Valdemar led a military and commercial enterprise called Rus’. Valdemar (Old East Slavic: Володимѣръ, Volodiměr) found it expedient to establish Christianity as the religion of his realm as part of an alliance with the major power in the Black Sea region, the Emperor of New Rome (Constantinople, Byzantium) —> History of the Ukrainian church. Many subjects of Rus’ were Slavs, and from this time on Christianity among the East Slavic peoples has been predominantly ‘Greek’ or ‘Hellenic’ or ‘Byzantine’. (But, much as some Australian Catholics avoid the epithets ‘Roman’ or ‘Latin’ [“I don’t come from Rome and I don’t speak Latin”], most Orthodox Ukrainians would find it odd to describe themselves as ‘Greek Orthodox’.)

Relations between the bishops and the churches of Rome and New Rome had been sometimes turbulent before 988, and, despite attempts to heal the breach (—> e.g. Florence, Church Union of), by the time of the death of Dr Martin Luther (18 February 1546, aged 62) not only were relations between the Roman and New Roman churches broken, but a third group, Protestant Christianity, had arisen, and relations between these groups were, at best, cautiously civil. It was not possible to be in full union with any two at once. One had to choose.

(Although many attempted to improve relations between these bodies [see, for example, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz and ‘The System of Leibniz’], the current thaw from icy relations is marked by the meeting of the Roman pontiff Paul VI and the Patriarch of Constantinople Athenagoras on 6 January 1964 on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem, where they prayed together and exchanged the kiss of peace. Since that day, some describe the relation of the two bishops and their churches as being ‘an impaired communion’.)

In 1589, when Patriarch Jeremias II Tranos elevated the bishop of Moscow to be a Patriarch, most Ruthenians (the people whose descendants would describe themselves as Ukrainians and Belarusians) found themselves in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth —> Union of Berestia :—

The Orthodox bishops worked out a plan for establishing ties with Rome at their sobors [synods] in 1590–4. The initiators of the plan hoped to gain not only ecclesiastical benefits from the union, but also an end to the Polonization of the upper classes and equality for the Orthodox church and its clergy in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. The union was supported by leading Polish circles because it was politically and religiously advantageous to them. Roman Catholic clerics [—> e.g. Skarga, Herbest] and the Orthodox bishops, especially Ipatii Potii [Potij], the bishop of Volodymyr-Volynskyi … all worked to bring about a union... On 22 June 1595 all nine Orthodox hierarchs signed a letter to Pope Clement VIII declaring that they were ready to enter into negotiations on church unification and authorizing bishops Kyrylo Terletsky and Potii to act for them in Rome. In September Potii and Terletsky left for Rome and, after long talks, set forth their confession of faith before the papal curia on 23 December 1595.

The union was announced by the papal bull Magnus Dominus on 23 December 1595. In January and February of 1596 the rights and privileges of the Uniate church were worked out and were guaranteed by the bull Decet Romanum Pontificem of 23 February 1596. The pope took the necessary steps to get the consent of the Polish government to the civil guarantees of the agreement, such as senatorial seats for the bishops, aid for the clergy and churches, and security of church property. After Ipatii Potii and Kyrylo Terletsky returned from Rome, a sobor was called in Berestia for 16–20 October 1596. The sobor split into two groups—for and against the union with Rome—and thus two councils went on concurrently… The union was accepted by Metropolitan Mykhailo Rahoza and five bishops, the hegumens, archimandrites, and part of the clergy and gentry. Each group condemned and anathematized the other. The sobor favoring the union, which was joined by most of the hierarchy, confirmed the union and proclaimed it before the people in a pastoral letter. The Polish king Sigismund III Vasa issued a proclamation in support of the union. The Apostolic See was represented at the sobor by the Roman Catholic bishops of Lviv, Lutsk, and Kholm, and the Polish government and crown were represented by several senators. The Jesuit Piotr Skarga made the closing speech on 20 October.

The Church Union of Berestia split the Ruthenian church and the faithful in two and led to a long and bitter domestic struggle… In the 18th century Uniate Catholicism became dominant in Right-Bank Ukraine, Galicia, and Transcarpathia. When these territories were annexed by Russia, Ukrainian Catholicism was forcibly liquidated: under Catherine II on the Right Bank and in Volhynia, under Nicholas I in the rest of these territories (1839), and under Alexander II in the Kholm region (1875). The Uniate church in Galicia and Transcarpathia survived under Austro-Hungarian rule (1772–1918), but was abolished in 1946–50 by the Soviet government, which orchestrated the sobors of Lviv (see Lviv Sobor of 1946), Mukachevo, and Prešov. As a result, the Ukrainian Catholic church survived officially only in the West, the Prešov region of Slovakia, Poland, and Yugoslavia until its restoration in Ukraine during the early 1990s.

I hope that I am not tendentious when I say that the Union of Berestia was a movement to secure the position of Ruthenian-rite Christians living in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth while preserving their Greek and Ruthenian heritage; that the unionists had no desire to end communion with the Patriarch in Constantinople; and that, given a situation in which the Ruthenians could not be simultaneously in communion with both Rome and Constantinople, the unionists can plausibly argue that they were prudent in seeking union with Rome.

Be that as it may,
on 1 August 1589 Patriarch Jeremias II Tranos (†4 September 1595, aged ca 59 — see Wiki OrthodoxWiki Britannica) consecrated Mychajlo Rohoza (†August 1599, aged 59), Archbishop of Kyiv-Halyč .

Mgr Mychajlo Rohoza was the principal consecrator
— in 1593, of Hipacy (Ipatij) Pociej (Potij) (†13 Jul 1613 aged 71), who succeeded Mychajlo at Kyiv-Halyč;
— in 1595, of Herman Zahorskyi (Zahorski) (†1600) who became Archbishop of Połock (Polotsk) in Belarus later in the same year; and
— also in 1595, of Yona Hohol (†July 1602) who was Bishop of Pińsk-Turaŭ in Belarus.

Mychajlo, Hipacy, Herman and Yona entered into full communion with the Roman church on 19 October 1596, while Paul V (Camillo Borghese, †28 January 1621, aged 70) was sovereign pontiff.

The Ukrainian and Ruthenian Catholic Clergy — including the publisher of Just Peace Ukraine — discover their episcopal lineage in Patriarch Jeremias and Mgr Mychajlo Rohoza, Archbishop of Kyiv-Halyč.

(E & o e; any brief statement about the Union of Berestia is likely to be controversial; friendly queries and comments by persons who’ve read the Internet Encyclopedia of Ukraine articles mentioned in this footnote may be sent to ☼☼Abbe.Martincurt@gmail.com☼☼ Martin Arnold, publisher.)

TL;DRussia Weekend Roundup - tldrussia.substack.com › tldrussia-weekend-roundup-e2a 28 January 2023 — bold type mine M.A.

Samuel Greene is professor in Russian politics at King’s College London. Before moving to London in 2012 to join King’s, he lived and worked in Moscow for 13 years, most recently as director of the Centre for the Study of New Media & Society at the New Economic School, and as deputy director of the Carnegie Moscow Center. He holds a PhD in political sociology from the London School of Economics & Political Science.