Chicago priest killed in bicycle crash
Written by Clement
Friday, 07 September 2007
Please remember in prayers a dear friend to the Eastern Catholic Churches in Chicago, the Priest Pavlo Hayda, of St. Joseph's Ukrainian Catholic Church in Chicago. Father Pavlo was killed on the morning of September 4th in a traffic accident.
Father Pavlo leaves behind his wife, Christine, and four young sons, Julian, Zachary, Elias and Dymytrij.
May his memory be eternal. And may the Lord comfort his family.
St. Joseph's Ukrainian Catholic parish website is
http://www.stjosephucc.org/ By Jeremy Gorner and Carolyn Rusin | Chicago Tribune
4:06 AM CDT, September 5, 2007
The pastor of a Ukrainian Catholic church on Chicago's Northwest Side died Tuesday after his bicycle and a sport-utility vehicle collided in Des Plaines, police said.
Rev. Pavlo Hayda, 42, was riding a bicycle eastbound in the 1900 block of East Oakton Street about 11 a.m. when the bicycle and the SUV collided as the SUV was exiting the driveway of an apartment complex, police in the northwest suburb said.
Father Hayda, the pastor of St. Joseph the Betrothed Ukrainian Byzantine-Catholic Church, 5000 N. Cumberland Ave., was pronounced dead at 12:27 p.m. at Advocate Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge, said Des Plaines Deputy Police Chief Bill Schneider.
"We're going through a bit of a shock right now," said the Very Rev. Canon Thomas Glynn, an associate pastor at St. Joseph.
The driver of the vehicle was ticketed for failing to reduce speed to avoid an accident and failing to exercise due caution, police said.
Father Hayda, was a native of Battle Creek, Mich. who had been a priest at St. Joseph since July 1995, according to the church's Web site. The church is Catholic but follows the traditions and liturgical religious expressions of the Catholic Church's Eastern Byzantine rite.
According to the church's Web site, Father Hayda came from a long lineage of priests, going back hundreds of years. But it wasn't until his high school years, while living in Connecticut, that he decided to become a priest, his family said.
"He honestly felt he had a calling for it," his brother, Borys Hayda, 48, said in a telephone interview early this morning. "By this work, he was obviously meant for it."
Father Hayda attended St. Basil's College Seminary in Stamford, Conn., where he received a bachelor's degree in philosophy in 1986. He got a master's degree in divinity in 1991 from the Catholic Theological Union in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood.
Borys Hayda said his brother enjoyed working with children, educating them about religion and parish life.
Father Hayda taught religion at a Ukrainian Catholic school and sang in choirs, his church's Web site said. He was also a visiting faculty member at DePaul University's School of New Learning, according to that school's Web site.
Father Hayda and his wife, Christine, were married in 1991, and he was ordained into the priesthood a year later in Lviv, Ukraine at St. George's Cathedral, the same cathedral where his grandfather had been ordained.
Unlike Catholic priests in the Latin or Roman rite, it's not uncommon for those from the Eastern rites to be married before being ordained. Father Hayda even appeared on NBC Nightly News in 2002 to discuss how his marriage had benefited his priesthood.
Borys Hayda said his brother had just dropped off his car in Des Plaines to get it repaired, and was riding his bike back to the church when the collision occurred.
"He's [Father Hayda] a great guy, and were going to miss him tremendously," Borys Hayda said.
In addition to his wife and brother, Father Hayda is survived by four sons, including twins, two other brothers and his mother and father. Funeral arrangements were pending as of early this morning, but services will be held at St. Joseph, Borys Hayda said.
Last Updated ( Wednesday, 10 October 2007 )
