www.byzcath.org Forums News & Events Church News Kostomloty, Poland: a "neo-uniate" parish under local RC bishop

Quite simple: Neo-Unia or Neo-Union was the unionist movement on Byelorussian and Ukrainian (outside Galicia) lands of pre-war Poland. Some parishes using Byzantine-Slavic (i.e. Russian Synodal) Rite were created within boundaries of five Latin dioceses (Polish prew-war authorities never allowed Eastern Catholic hierachy outside Galicia).

Paleo-Unia is a term of my own - it means of course the Church of the heirs of Brest Union (1596) tradition.

Since 16th century is obviously "older" than the 20th one, one may easily see which Union should be considered "new" ("neos" in Greek) and which seems rather "old" ("paleos" in Greek) at least in comparison with the former.


BTW: Fr. Archimandrite Roman Piętka MIC died out of cancer just yesterday evening.

ETERNAL MEMORY - VICHNAYA PAMYAT'!

May seem ultracorrect, but it was certainly not "more than forty years". Just 39.



Reverend Father Archimandrite,

A few questions arose:

1) Why "now"? What has the death of the retired pastor changed?

2) Which "Polish Cardinal" do you mean? The only active Polish RC hierarch in red hat is Metropolitan of Cracow, former secretary to John Paul II, S. Dziwisz. What does he have in common with Kostomloty case?

3) How a Neo-Uniate parish could be "restored to the Greek-Catholic jurisdiction" taking into account that the parish in question, as Neo-Uniate, had never been under GC hierarchy?

I'd love you to read my post from yesterday - just here in this thread. The situation in Kostomloty at present is not what we had been scary of in 2007.

Do read more carefully. St. Nicetas the Martyr had not been "neo-Uniate", but then I never claimed that it had been. It was Greek-Catholic from the seventeenth century until about 1875, being a parish of the Eparchy of Kholm. It returned to the Catholic Church after World War I, at a time when the Poles would not allow a Greek-Catholic bishop to serve our parishes outside of Galicia. In the early nineteen-thirties St. Nicetas the Martyr was among the parishes relating to Blessed Nichols (Czarnecky), the thaumaturg and hieromartyr, but again the Poles would not allow him to function properly - he never served as bishop in Kostomloty.

After World War II, the Polish hierarchy used strong pressure to make the "neo-Uniate" parishes accept the Roman liturgical tradition. Saint Nicetas the Martyr was the only hold-out, thanks at first to the pastor in place and then to Father Roman Pietka, who managed to keep the parish going after Father Prylutski had to retire during the later nineteen-sixties. Father Roman was an expert in dealing with the Polish RC hierarchy, and kept the parish going during the four decades (that's 40 years) or so of his tenure.

So it is. We must pray fervently that the parish be restored to the Greek-Catholic Church authority.

Fr. Serge

What are the wearabouts of Archimandrite Sergiusz Gajek, MIC. Last I heard he was in Belarus. Is there any possibiity that he might be tapped for a hierarchical position?
Silouan

Father Archimandrite Serge (Gajek) was among the concelebrants yesterday at the new Patriarch's enthronement. He may have stayed in Kyiv overnight before returning to Poland and Belarus.

Fr. Serge

Dear Father Serge,

Bless!

I thought you might see this if I posted this here...

One of our posters requested (posted in a thread addressed to you)
that you clean out your mailbox (a little spring cleaning, so to speak)--so that he can contact you about something.

Respectfully,
In Christ,
Alice

I'll try to get to it - no promises!

fraternally in Christ,

Archimandrite Serge