Blessed Ivan Ziatyk, 1899 – 1952Blessed Ivan Ziatyk
(1899-1952) 

Ivan Ziatyk was born on 26 December 1899 in the village of Odrekhova, some 20 kilometers south-west of the town of Sanok (now a territory of Poland). His parents, Stefan and Maria, were poor peasants. When Ivan was 14, his father died. The burden of bringing up the child was taken up by his mother and elder brother Mykhailo, who took the place of his father for Ivan.

In his childhood, Ivan was very quiet and obedient. Already when studying in the village primary school, he displayed his capabilities as a gifted student. It was also possible to to notice the boy’s profound piety. Ivan received his secondary education in the Sanok gymnasium, where he studied from 1911-1919. During his studies in the gymnasium, Ivan’s academic performance was very good and his behaviour excellent. In 1919 Ivan Ziatyk entered the Ukrainian Catholic Seminary in Przemysl, and he graduated with distinction on 30 June 1923. That same year, after having completed his theological studies, Ivan Ziatyk was ordained a priest.

From 1925-1935 Fr. Ziatyk worked as a prefect of the Ukrainian Catholic Seminary in Przhemysl. In addition to the spiritual direction of the seminarians, he also contributed to their intellectual formation: He taught Catechetics and Dogmatic Theology at the same Seminary. In addition to his work at the Seminary, Fr. Ivan Ziatyk also performed the duties of spiritual director and catechetics teacher at the Ukrainian Girls’ Gymnasium in Przemysl.

Fr. Ivan Ziatyk was a person of great kindness, obedience, and spiritual depth. He always made a deep impression on those around him. Fr. Ziatyk for quite a long time had had a desire to join a monastery. Although this intention was not welcomed by his Church superiors, on 15 July 1935 Fr. Ivan Ziatyk made the final decision to join the Redemptorist Congregation.

After completing his novitiate in Holosko (near Lviv) in 1936, Fr. Ziatyk was sent to the monastery of Our Lady of Perpetual Help in Stanislaviv (now Ivano-Frankivsk). However, he did not stay long: in autumn of 1937 Fr. Ziatyk moved to Lviv, to the monastery at number 56-58 Zyblykevycha (now Ivana Franka) Street. There, he took charge as economo of the monastery. Fr. Ziatyk’s duty also was to substitute the superior, Fr. De Vocht, in his absence. In 1934 the Redemptorists opened their Seminary in Holosko, and Fr. Ziatyk joined its faculty as a professor of Scripture and Dogmatic Theology. From 1941-1944 Fr. Ziatyk was superior of the monastery of Dormition of Mother of God in Ternopil, and from 1944-1946 he was superior of the monastery of Our Lady of Perpetual Help in Zboiska (near Lviv), where the Redemptorist gymnasium (“Juvenate”) was based.

The end of World War II was the beginning of a terrible period in the history of Ukraine, of the Greek-Catholic Church, and of the Lviv Province of CSsR. Having arrested all the Greek-Catholic bishops, in the spring of 1946 Soviet secret police gathered Redemptorists from Ternopil, Stanislaviv, Lviv, and Zboiska to Holosko, and placed them in a non-heated wing of the monastery. Fr. Ziatyk was among those gathered in Holosko. Redemptorists stayed there for two years under constant surveillance of the secret police. Their presence was checked three or four times a week. The confreres were often taken for interrogation, in the course of which they were promised various benefits in exchange for betrayal of their faith and monastic vocation. On 17 October 1948 all the Redemptorists staying in Holosko were told to board trucks which transported them to the Studite monastery in Univ.

Soon thereafter, the Redemptorist Provincial Fr. Joseph De Vocht was deported to Belgium. Before his departure, he transferred his duties of Provincial of the Lviv Province and of Vicar General of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church to Fr. Ivan Ziatyk. This caused the police to pay special attention to Fr. Ziatyk. On 5 January 1950 a decision was made to arrest him, and on 20 January the warrant was issued. After numerous interrogations, on 4 February 1950 Fr. Ivan Ziatyk was accused: “Ivan Ziatyk indeed has been a member of the Redemptorist order since 1936; he promotes the ideas of the Roman Pope of spreading the Catholic Faith among the nations of the whole world and of making all Catholics”.

The investigation of Fr. Ziatyk’s case lasted for two years. Fr. Ziatyk spent the entire period in the Lviv and Zolochiv prisons. During the period from 4 July 1950 to 16 August 1951 alone, he was interrogated 38 times, while the total number of interrogations he underwent was 72. Despite the cruel tortures that accompanied interrogations, Fr. Ziatyk did not betray his faith and did not submit to the atheist regime, although his close relatives were accustomed to persuade him to do so.

The verdict was announced to Fr. Ziatyk in Kiev on 21 November 1951. He was sentenced to 10 years imprisonment for “cooperating with anti-Soviet nationalistic organization and anti-Soviet propaganda”. The term was to be served in the Ozernyi Lager prison camp near the town of Bratsk in Irkutsk region.

During his imprisonment, Fr. Ziatyk suffered terrible tortures. According to witnesses, on Good Friday 1952 Fr. Ivan Ziatyk was heavily beaten with sticks, soaked in water, and left unconscious outside, in the Siberian frost. Beating and cold caused his death in a prison hospital three days later, on 17 May 1952. Fr. Ziatyk was buried in the Taishet district of Irkutsk region. The Great Architect laid another precious tile into the great mosaic of martyrdom…

Taking into account the testimonies of Fr. Ivan Ziatyk’s virtuous life, and particularly his endurance, courage and faithfulness to the Christ’s Church during the period of persecution, the beatification process was started on the occasion of the Jubilee Year. On 2 March 2001 the process was completed on the level of eparchy, and the case was handed over to the Apostolic See. On 6 April 2001 the theological committee recognized the fact of Fr. Ziatyk’s martyrdom, on 23 April his martyrdom was verified by the Assembly of Cardinals, and on 24 April 2001 Most Holy Father John Paul II signed a decree of beatification of Fr. Ivan Ziatyk, a blessed martyr of Christian faith.

SOURCE: http://www.cssr.com/english/saintsblessed/ziatyk.shtml

Blessed Kliment Septyckyj, 1869 – 1951 

Blessed Archimandrite Clement Sheptytsky, the younger brother of Blessed Metropolitan Andriy Sheptytsky, was born on 17 November 1869 in the village of Prylbychi, Lviv Region. In 1911, at the age of 40, he entered the monastery of St Theodore the Studite; by so doing he renounced a promising secular career. He received his theological education in Innsbruck. On 28 August 1915 he was ordained to the priesthood. For a long time he was the Hegumenos (Prior) of the Studite monastery at Univ, and in 1944 he became the Archimandrite (Abbot). During World War II, he gave refuge to persecuted Jews. On 5 June 1947, he was arrested by the NKVD (KGB) agents and sentenced to eight years of hard labour. He died a martyr for the faith on 1 May 1951 in the Vladimir prison.

SOURCE: http://www.ewtn.com/library/MARY/bios2001.htm#Clement

Blessed Oleksa Zarytsky
Greek Catholic Martyr 
1912 – 1963

“Blessed Fr. Oleksa Zarytsky was born in 1912 in the village of Biche, in the Lviv Region. In 1931, he entered the seminary in Lviv. He received his ordination to the priesthood from Metropolitan Andrei Sheptyts’kyi in 1936. In 1948, he was imprisoned for ten years and deported to Karaganda. After his early release in 1957, he was named Apostolic Administrator of Kazakhstan and Siberia, but was shortly thereafter imprisoned again for a three-year term. He died as a martyr for the faith on 30 October 1963 in the Dolynka concentration camp near Karaganda.”

Source: http://newsaints.faithweb.com/biographies/Ukraine.htm

Blessed Vitalij Volodymyr Bajrak, 1907-1946 From SQPN:

Also known as

 Vitalii Bairak
 Vitalij Bajrak
 Volodomyr Bairak

Memorial

2 April

Profile

Greek Catholic. Joined the Basilian Order of Saint Josaphat monastery on 4 September 1924. Ordained on 13 August 1933. Prior of Drohobych in 1941. Arrested for his faith on 17 September 1945 by the NKVD. On 13 November 1945 his property was confiscated, and he was sentenced to eight years in a forced labour camp. Died in prison; martyr.

Born

24 February 1907 at Shvaikivtsy, Ternopil’s’ka oblast’, Ukraine

Died

beaten to death on 21 April in 1946 in prison at Drohobych, L’vivs’ka oblast’, Ukraine

Blessed Kliment Septyckyj, 1869 – 1951 

Blessed Archimandrite Clement Sheptytsky, the younger brother of Blessed Metropolitan Andriy Sheptytsky, was born on 17 November 1869 in the village of Prylbychi, Lviv Region. In 1911, at the age of 40, he entered the monastery of St Theodore the Studite; by so doing he renounced a promising secular career. He received his theological education in Innsbruck. On 28 August 1915 he was ordained to the priesthood. For a long time he was the Hegumenos (Prior) of the Studite monastery at Univ, and in 1944 he became the Archimandrite (Abbot). During World War II, he gave refuge to persecuted Jews. On 5 June 1947, he was arrested by the NKVD (KGB) agents and sentenced to eight years of hard labour. He died a martyr for the faith on 1 May 1951 in the Vladimir prison.

SOURCE: http://www.ewtn.com/library/MARY/bios2001.htm#Clement

Basilian Bishop, Kyr Dionysius Lachovicz, OSBM.

Four Basilian Consecrated Without Mandate This Month

In November 2007, the Catholic World News (www.cwnews.com/news/viewstory.cfm?recnum=54919) reported on excommunication of Father Basil Kovpak, the head of the Priestly Society of Saint Josaphat Kuntsevych (SSJK), a group with ties to the traditionalist Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) which has been active among Byzantine Catholics in the Ukraine since the early 1990s. Bishops of the SPPX – themselves excommunicated because they were consecrated without approval from the Holy See – ordained two priests and seven deacons for the SSJK. On 23 March 2008, this past Easter Sunday (according to the Gregorian Calendar), the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church (UGCC) published a communiqué about the latest schism to divide its unstable ranks. Four members of the Basilian Order of St. Josaphat – Eliáš Dohnal, Metoděj Špiřík, Markian Hitiuk and Robert Oberhauser – were consecrated bishops without having been nominated by the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Synod and without a papal approval. Thus, according to CCEO, canon 1459 §1, they have automatically encurred the penalty of excommunication.

consecrated a bishop in the underground church, on September 6, 1989, by Metropolitan Volodymyr Sterniuk and Bishop Filemon Kurchaba. Conveniently, both hierarchs are now dead and unable to confirm this claim. An article about Mychajlo Osidach’s episcopal consecration appears on a website associated with the four schismatic bishops (www.community.org.ua/ukrindex.html).

The this new schism has been in the incubation phase for years, having plagued the Basilian Order and the UGCC for over a decade.

However, the one who actually laid the egg that hatched this past Easter is Bishop Dionysius Lachovicz, the previous General Superior of the Basilian Order and now curial bishop of the UGCC. During his term as General Superior, he was infatuated with this messianic group and convinced of their savific role in the reform his order. Even against the advice of his general council, Lachovicz made decisions in favour of this group to the harm of his Order and to the Church, not only in Ukraine, but also in the Czech Republic and in Slovakia. In the autumn of 1997, Lachovicz had been warned by the Basilian Superior in Poland, Volodymyr Juszczak (currently Bishop of Wroclaw-Gdansk), and by the entire Basilian provincial council in Slovakia, that this “potential sect” would, in the long run, cause grave damage to the Church if given a special mission within the Basilian Order. Despite such warnings, on 21 October 1997, Lachovicz issued a decree giving this divisive group the canonical status of an “experimental community”, under his own personal authority as General. Further, Lachovicz put their own leader, Eliáš Dohnal, in charge of forming the group’s novices, even though they had been dismissed from the Basilian novitiate in Poland. Nevertheless, on 11 May 1998, after a canonical visitation confirmed serious problems within this new community, Lachovicz was forced to revoke the canonical status of this “messianic group”. He issued a second decree on 9 December 1998, confirming the abolition of the experimental community, after the group petitioned the Congregation of the Oriental Churches for permission to set up an autonomous monastery in Slovakia against the will of the Bishop of Presov, Ivan Hirka.

By this point, you would think Lachovicz might have realised that this group has sectarian tendencies and were a threat to the Basilian Order’s stability and reputation. Nevertheless, at the request to renew the Basilian presence in the Czech Republic of Greek-Catholic Apostolic Exarch, Ivan Ljavinec, Lachovicz signed a contract with both Ljavinec and Prague’s Archbishop, Miloslav Cardinal Vlk on 2 November 1999. Lachovicz then assigned these controversial Basilian monks to form this new Basilian community. Moreover, Lachovicz even elevated the canonical status of their group to a “delegature” the Basilian Order. It didn’t take long for the Prague community to wage war against its Apostolic Exarch, resulting in Bishop Ljavinec withdrawing pastoral jurisdiction from Metoděj Špiřík and Markian Hitiuk. In the meantime, on April 24, 2003, Ladislav Hučko was named to replace Ljavinec as exarch. On the day of Hučko’s consecration, 31 May 2003, this Basilian group organised a protest against the bishop-elect, blockading the Greek-Catholic Cathedral and forcing Hučko to receive his episcopal consecration in a nearby Roman Catholic parish. Not surprsingly, on 26 June 2003, Bishop Hučko asked the civil authorities to anull the registration of the Basilian Delegature in the Czech Republic. It should be noted that, the same year, this Basilian group also opened a monastery in Nitra, Slovakia, without the permission of either the Basilian Order or the local Slovakian Bishop.

Now that this group had burnt all of its bridges in Poland, Slovakia and the Czech Republic, Lachovicz sent them to to the Basilian monastery in Pidhirtsi, Ukraine. It was here that this fringe group sunk its roots into the soil of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church. Lachovicz even wrote letters to the Lviv Metropolia’s Commission on the Family recommending some of these monks as retreat masters and formators. However, his “experimental community” saw its end at the Basilian General Chapter in 2004, which di not re-elect Lachovicz and which finally abolished the Czech Delegature.

Episcopal consecrations without a papal mandate are not a novelty in the UGCC and, while much more could be said, the intent of this post was to trace the genesis of these four new schismatic Basilian bishops. No one knows what bizzare turn this easter-egg tale will now take. Bishop Lachovicz has recently been nominated by the Ukrainian Catholic Synod of Bishops as substitute administrator in the case that Cardinal Cardinal Husar is unable to fulfill his office. If Lachovicz takes the helm of the UGCC, are we to expect the four schismatics Basilians to receive episcopal faculties? One cannot help but wonder how the UGCC’s crisis in leadership will end?

With a Patriarchate?

Is this a Greek Catholic Version of the SSPX?

+ Metoděj R. Špiřík OSBM

+ Eliáš A. Dohnal OSBM

Your Holiness, from among celibate or religious priests we alone have remained in fact (though there is a large number of priests in the UGCC who have the same attitude of mind) who have the courage to defend the identity of the UGCC as well as Your primacy and infallibility. We have faith, too, in the revival of our Church, and that was why we resolved to make this daring step.

Into Your hands, in regard of can. 1060 §1 pt. 2 CCEO, we commit the future of us and of the whole UGCC. Through this daring step of ours God is giving a chance even to You to open the Church for a spiritual awakening. In the time of Communism it was allowed not to respect certain canonical paragraphs with regard to an extraordinary situation. In the present time, even though there is external freedom, the conditions in our UGCC are, from a certain point of view, harder than in the time of illegality. Therefore the rule that was valid in illegality holds true even in our situation. Who consecrated us, when and where, this we will announce to You personally.

We share with You the unity of faith and are willing even to lay down our lives for the sake of You as the Vicar of Christ and for the sake of the Catholic Church. Your Holiness, even if You condemn us, we do remain Greek-Catholic bishops, but You would thus in fact condemn You Yourself and the whole truly Catholic stream in the Catholic Church which we represent. For we are striving for nothing else but in unity with You for the spiritual resurrection of the Church – for the purification of faith from HCT, from false respect for other religions, from the spirit of New Age and from moral delinquencies of the Church hierarchy – this all today is liquidating the Church at the root.

Both to You and to the Synod of UGCC we propose the following solution:

1.  

    

   1. To install one of us as diocesan bishop in the vacant Buchach eparchy (several weeks ago Bishop I. Bilyk OSBM was driven away from here by Card. L. Husar.), or in the planned Brody eparchy, or to divide the large eparchies into two.

    

   2. To include the rest of us as auxiliary bishops, or to assign us for the renewal of religious, priests and seminaries, and at the same time to make the OSBM Monastery of Annunciation in Pidhirtsi exempt from the Order of St. Basil the Great and to establish it as a monastery of pontifical right. To appoint one of us three (+ Metoděj OSBM, + Markian OSBM, + Eliáš OSBM) as archimandrite.

With gratefulness in advance for Your blessing to the episcopal consecration and for the appointment to the service in the UGCC, and with a promise of faithfulness to You and to the Catholic Church:

+ Eliáš A. Dohnal OSBM

+ Metoděj R. Špiřík OSBM+ Markian V. Hitiuk OSBM+ Samuel R. Oberhauser

Monastery OSBM

Pidhirtsi, March 3, 2008

Copies to:

• Cardinals and bishops of the Catholic Church
• Synod of UGCC

Address: Monastery OSBM, Pidhirtsi 80660, Brody district, Lvov region, Ukrainewww.community.org.ua

More details on the UGCC bishop who has acted as their patron at least up into this point.

Is this a Greek Catholic Version of the SSPX?

+ Metoděj R. Špiřík OSBM

+ Eliáš A. Dohnal OSBM

Your Holiness, from among celibate or religious priests we alone have remained in fact (though there is a large number of priests in the UGCC who have the same attitude of mind) who have the courage to defend the identity of the UGCC as well as Your primacy and infallibility. We have faith, too, in the revival of our Church, and that was why we resolved to make this daring step.

Into Your hands, in regard of can. 1060 §1 pt. 2 CCEO, we commit the future of us and of the whole UGCC. Through this daring step of ours God is giving a chance even to You to open the Church for a spiritual awakening. In the time of Communism it was allowed not to respect certain canonical paragraphs with regard to an extraordinary situation. In the present time, even though there is external freedom, the conditions in our UGCC are, from a certain point of view, harder than in the time of illegality. Therefore the rule that was valid in illegality holds true even in our situation. Who consecrated us, when and where, this we will announce to You personally.

We share with You the unity of faith and are willing even to lay down our lives for the sake of You as the Vicar of Christ and for the sake of the Catholic Church. Your Holiness, even if You condemn us, we do remain Greek-Catholic bishops, but You would thus in fact condemn You Yourself and the whole truly Catholic stream in the Catholic Church which we represent. For we are striving for nothing else but in unity with You for the spiritual resurrection of the Church – for the purification of faith from HCT, from false respect for other religions, from the spirit of New Age and from moral delinquencies of the Church hierarchy – this all today is liquidating the Church at the root.

Both to You and to the Synod of UGCC we propose the following solution:

1.  

   1. To install one of us as diocesan bishop in the vacant Buchach eparchy (several weeks ago Bishop I. Bilyk OSBM was driven away from here by Card. L. Husar.), or in the planned Brody eparchy, or to divide the large eparchies into two.

    

   2. To include the rest of us as auxiliary bishops, or to assign us for the renewal of religious, priests and seminaries, and at the same time to make the OSBM Monastery of Annunciation in Pidhirtsi exempt from the Order of St. Basil the Great and to establish it as a monastery of pontifical right. To appoint one of us three (+ Metoděj OSBM, + Markian OSBM, + Eliáš OSBM) as archimandrite.

With gratefulness in advance for Your blessing to the episcopal consecration and for the appointment to the service in the UGCC, and with a promise of faithfulness to You and to the Catholic Church:

+ Eliáš A. Dohnal OSBM

+ Metoděj R. Špiřík OSBM+ Markian V. Hitiuk OSBM+ Samuel R. Oberhauser

Monastery OSBM

Pidhirtsi, March 3, 2008

Copies to:

• Cardinals and bishops of the Catholic Church
• Synod of UGCC

Address: Monastery OSBM, Pidhirtsi 80660, Brody district, Lvov region, Ukrainewww.community.org.ua

More details on the UGCC bishop who has acted as their patron at least up into this point.