United with the Catholics in Ukraine who are under attack

Discussion in 'The Signs of the Times' started by Basto, Mar 3, 2022.

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  1. Basto

    Basto Guest

    Appeal of His Beatitude Sviatoslav on outbreak of war
    Today we solemnly proclaim: “Our soul and body offer we for our freedom! With one heart we pray: “Lord, Great and Almighty, protect our beloved Ukraine!”

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    Beloved in God people of Ukraine!


    Our country is in danger again!

    The treacherous enemy, despite his own commitments and assurances, breaking the basic norms of international law, as an unjust aggressor, stepped on Ukrainian soil, bringing with him death and destruction.

    Our Ukraine, which the world fairly called "lands of blood", which has been so many times sprinkled with the blood of martyrs and fighters for the freedom and independence of its people, calls us today to stand up for it - to defend its dignity before God and humanity, its rights for existence and the right to choose one's future.

    It is our natural right and sacred duty to defend our land and our people, our state and all that is dearest to us: family, language and culture, history and the spiritual world! We are a peaceful nation that loves children of all nations with Christian love, regardless of origin or belief, nationality or religious identity.

    We do not infringe upon others and do not threaten anyone, but we have no right to give our own to anyone! At this historic moment, the voice of our conscience calls us all as one to stand up for a free, united and independent Ukrainian State!

    The history of the last century teaches us that all those who started world wars lost them, and the idolaters of war brought only destruction and decline to their own states and peoples.

    We believe that in this historic moment the Lord is with us! He, who holds in his hands the fate of the whole world and of each person in particular, is always on the side of the victims of unjust aggression, the suffering and the enslaved. It is He who proclaims His holy Name in the history of every nation, captures and overthrows the mighty of this world with their pride, the conquerors with the illusion of their omnipotence, the proud and insolent with their self-confidence. It is He who grants victory over evil and death. The victory of Ukraine will be the victory of God's power over the meanness and arrogance of man! So it was, is and will be!

    Our holy Church-Martyr has always been and always will be with its people! This Church, which has already survived death and resurrection, as the Body of the Risen Christ, over which death has no power, the Lord gave to his people in the baptismal waters of the Dnipro River.

    Since then, the history of our people and its Church, the history of their liberation struggles, the history of the incarnation of God's Word and the manifestation of His Spirit of truth in our culture have intertwined forever. And in this dramatic moment, our Church, as a mother and teacher will be with its children, will protect them and serve them in the name of God! In God is our hope and our victory will come from Him!

    Today we solemnly proclaim: “Our soul and body offer we for our freedom! With one heart we pray: “Lord, Great and Almighty, protect our beloved Ukraine!”

    Holy righteous people, martyrs and confessors of the Ukrainian land, pray and intercede for us before God!

    God’s blessing be upon you!

    † Sviatoslav

    Given in Kyiv

    at the Patriarchal Cathedral of the Resurrection of Christ,

    February 24, 2021 A.D.
    http://news.ugcc.ua/en/articles/appeal_of_his_beatitude_sviatoslav_on_outbreak_of_war_95772.html



    This thread is dedicated to the Eastern Catholics, especially those from Ukraine, who have been in deep suffering and anguish since the beginning of Russian aggression.

    We are united with you in prayer and penance and we share your pain and anguish. In the end, the Immaculate Heart of Mary will triumph, Russia will be converted and there will be peace.

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    Fatima, February 24, 2022.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Mar 3, 2022
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  2. Basto

    Basto Guest

    Head of the UGCC urges everyone who is able to go to church and sacrifice Holy Communion for our soldiers

    His Beatitude Sviatoslav, the Father and Head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, appealed for people from Kyiv and added: "Sacrifice Him for those who are wounded today, destitute, who are on the roads as refugees of this murderous war in Ukraine."

    “Greetings from Ukrainian Kyiv! Today is Sunday, February 27, 2022. We had another terrible night. But after night day comes, morning comes, after darkness comes light. Similarly, after death the resurrection comes, which we all celebrate today”, - he said.

    “However, today Kyiv citizens will not be able to go to church because curfew has been declared and everyone must be at home due to the threat to human lives. But then the church will come to the people. Our priests will go to the underground, to the bomb shelters and will perform Divine Liturgies”, the Head of the Church informed.

    He emphasized that Church stays with their people.

    His Beatitude Sviatoslav expressed his sincere gratitude to all those who defend Ukraine in various ways. We see that all public services, in particular in Kyiv, are working on the highest level. "We once doubted whether our institutions are strong. Now we see that our state has passed and is passing the test of strength," he said.

    The Head of the UGCC thanks our soldiers, as well as the Emergency Situations Service of Ukraine, which today is rescuing the wounded, our medics who saved hundreds of lives that night, our firefighters who put out hundreds of fires throughout Ukraine. He thanked everyone who worked for victory.

    “I want to appeal to our people in the settlements, our brothers and sisters in different countries of the world. Thank you for empathizing with us. Thank you to our bishops from Australia, Argentina, Brazil, North America, and Western Europe, who have organized a great national solidarity with our Ukrainian people. Thank you for trying to tell the world the truth about Ukraine today, collecting humanitarian aid, medicines or just praying for Ukraine's victory”, he said.

    The Head of the UGCC from the Holy Mountains of Kyiv, from our capital city of Kyiv, gave everyone a joyful Sunday blessing.

    The UGCC Department for Information

    http://news.ugcc.ua/en/news/head_of...ce_holy_communion_for_our_soldiers_95829.html


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  3. AED

    AED Powers

    Prayers are going up!
     
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  4. HeavenlyHosts

    HeavenlyHosts Powers

    Yes, prayers and devotions going up.
     
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  5. Jo M

    Jo M Powers

    Rosary said for Ukraine..
     
  6. Basto

    Basto Guest

    Sviatoslav Shevchuk, the head of the Ukrainian Catholics: do everything so that the aggressor retreat and leave the land of Ukraine.



    "No one has the right to stay silent."
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Mar 3, 2022
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  7. AED

    AED Powers

    Matt Fradd (pints with Aquinas) is right now on his way to Poland to bring medical supplies to Krakow for the poor Ukrainian refugees. His friend Father Jason is there and asked him to come. A donate button for the Eparchy to help with the refugees will be up soon.
     
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  8. Basto

    Basto Guest

    Ukrainian Greek Catholic Archbishop Borys Gudziak fears for Ukrainian Catholic Church in this Russian invasion

     
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  9. AED

    AED Powers

    Just saw him on ewtn.
     
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  10. Sam

    Sam Powers



    And EWTN is praying a rosary for peace-the Ukraine{your own intentions} every day after Mass 9am ET.
     
  11. Basto

    Basto Guest

    We saw once more this night the horror of death

     
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  12. Basto

    Basto Guest

    Prayer for the consecration and convertion of Russia composed by bishop Athanasius Schneider



    O Immaculate Heart of Mary, you are the holy Mother of God and our tender Mother.

    Look upon the distress in which the Church and the whole of humanity are living because of the spread of materialism and the persecution of the Church.

    In Fatima, you warned against these errors, as you spoke about the errors of Russia. You are the Mediatrix of all graces.

    Implore your Divine Son to grant this special grace for the Pope: that he might consecrate Russia to your Immaculate Heart, so that Russia will be converted, a period of peace will be granted to the world, and your Immaculate Heart will triumph, through an authentic renewal of the Church in the splendor of the purity of the Catholic Faith, of the sacredness of Divine worship and of the holiness of the Christian life.

    O Queen of the Holy Rosary and our sweet Mother, turn your merciful eyes to us and graciously hear this our trusting prayer.

    Amen.

    Athanasius Schneider,
    Auxiliary Bishop of the archdiocese of Saint Mary in Astana

    https://www.gloriadei.io/prayer-for-the-holy-father-to-consecrate-russia/
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Mar 4, 2022
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  13. Carol55

    Carol55 Ave Maria

    Thank you Basto for all of the wonderful posts.

    ***



    The World Over March 3, 2022 | UKRAINE INVASION & the CHURCH, PUTIN'S ASSAULT on UKRAINE & MORE
    2,677 views | Mar 3, 2022
    INVASION OF UKRAINE & the CHURCH ARCHBISHOP BORYS GUDZIAK, of the Archeparchy of Philadelphia of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church talks about the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the condition of the Ukrainian faithful.
    PUTIN'S ASSAULT on UKRAINE STEVEN MOSHER, president of the Population Research Institute joins us with analysis of how the Russian invasion of Ukraine is being viewed by other countries around the world including China, and the NATO/US response.
    ANGEL STUDIOS NEAL HARMON, CEO of Angel Studios on the rise of crowd-funding for faith based & family entertainment.
    MARDI GRAS! RAYMOND ARROYO on his ride as Grand Marshal of the Krewe of Endymion Parade and why Mardi Gras matters.
     
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  14. HeavenlyHosts

    HeavenlyHosts Powers

    So happy about this Bishop and his prayer.
     
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  15. Basto

    Basto Guest

    Bishop in Ukraine fears Russia could brand priests, nuns as spies

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    St. Anthony Catholic Church is pictured in Kharkiv, Ukraine, March 3, 2022, in the aftermath of Russian rocket attacks that hit three churches.

    WARSAW, Poland (CNS) — Church leaders in embattled Ukraine have warned that foreign missionaries could be targeted by attacking forces, while many could be branded “NATO spies” if Russia occupies the country.

    “Clergy from Western countries will certainly be at risk — the Soviet rulers viewed priests and nuns as Vatican spies, and now they’ll be spies of NATO and the European Union,” Auxiliary Bishop Jan Sobilo of Kharkiv-Zaporizhia told Catholic News Service March 3.

    “Judging by what’s happened in other occupied areas, we can also expect restrictions on Masses and other activities. By defending Ukraine, we are also defending the Catholic Church,” he said.

    A Polish priest in Kharkiv said he also feared repression against foreign clergy, especially those from Poland and other NATO countries.

    “We were all given a free choice to leave or stay by our bishops — and while a few have had to go, almost everyone else has remained,” Father Wojciech Pasiewicz, director of the church’s Caritas Spes charity in the partly destroyed eastern city, told CNS March 3.

    “Given the restrictions and controls placed on freedom and democracy in Crimea and other regions, we can clearly expect the same here and anticipate real dangers from the Russians,” he said. “But what matters now is that this war ends, and people are allowed to return to their homes and churches.”

    “We are simply praying and doing all we can to stay in touch with our faithful, while many hide out in parish basements,” Father Pasiewicz told CNS. “The children are terrified, and there’s fear and panic everywhere, with some still hoping to be evacuated. We should all be praying for peace and mourning the dead, uniting in hope that this will all end today or tomorrow.”

    Bishop Sobilo told CNS the civilian population had now mobilized to defend the country. He said many Russian soldiers appeared “disorientated and demoralized” by the fierce Ukrainian reaction, but feared being shot if they attempted to surrender and withdraw.

    “President Putin has united this nation through the war, creating huge opposition to Russia,” the Polish-born auxiliary said.

    “Even those who were previously unsure which stance to take are now determined to fight to the end. They’ve seen how Russian propaganda works — and how this criminal state structure must be destroyed once for all for peace to be possible.”

    Hundreds of Polish priests and nuns have helped run Catholic parishes and charity projects since Ukraine’s 1991 independence and are currently stranded in its eastern and southern war zones.

    Polish Father Piotr Rosochacki, who heads Caritas-Spes on the Black Sea, told the Polish Catholic news agency KAI the situation was growing “increasingly desperate,” adding that “all principles for waging war” had been violated in the bitter fighting.

    Meanwhile, the Caritas director in Mariupol, Father Roscislav Spryniuk, told KAI attacking Russian troops had fired on residential areas, adding that shops and cashpoints were now empty.

    Bishop Sobilo told CNS some Polish clergy had been forced to leave for health reasons or a lack of relevant documents, adding that he had ordered one priest to quit his parish, unwillingly, fearing harm from Russian troops.

    However, he added that the “decisive majority” had remained in place, helping people who had fled other cities.

    “In Russia itself, the Catholic Church isn’t well regarded and has continual problems,” he told CNS. “So we can be sure we’ll find ourselves in a very difficult, bad situation if we’re occupied.”

    Russia’s forces, amassed in border regions since last fall, invaded Ukraine Feb. 24, triggering harsh resistance from the country’s 200,000-strong armed forces, as well as a sharp fall in Russia’s ruble currency amid Western economic sanctions and pledges of military assistance.

    Russian troops continued to close on Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, March 3 as tens of thousands fled the fighting and Western governments backed an investigation by the International Criminal Court into alleged war crimes by invading forces.

    Shelling damaged the Assumption Orthodox Cathedral in Kharkiv, reportedly with windows and other decorations broken, The Associated Press reported March 3.

    In his national address that day, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy pledged to restore Kharkiv’s cathedral.

    “Even if you destroy all our Ukrainian cathedrals and churches, you will not destroy our sincere faith in Ukraine and in God,” the president told Russians.

    The Associated Press also reported that representatives of Russia and Ukraine had agreed to allow humanitarian corridors to allow for aid and for civilians to evacuate.​

    https://catholicreview.org/bishop-in-ukraine-fears-russia-could-brand-priests-nuns-as-spies/


    History repeats itself... It's not that we weren't warned.
     
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  16. Basto

    Basto Guest

    O Archangel Michael and all the powers of Heaven fight for Ukraine! Cast down the devil who is attacking us and killing us, bringing devastation and death.



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    Saint Michael the Archangel, patron saint of Kyiv, located in the Independence Square.
     
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  17. Basto

    Basto Guest

    20 years ago, John Paul II publicly recognized the inviolability of the borders of Ukraine, for which blood is being shed today, - Head of the UGCC

    In an interview on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of Pope John Paul II's visit to Ukraine, Patriarch Sviatoslav said that 20 years have passed since the Pope's visit, and we still remember this event as unique in the history of our state and explained why.

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    The interview of His Beatitude Sviatoslav to ICTV journalists on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the visit of John Paul II in Ukraine was released on Tuesday, June 22 [2021], by the UGCC Information Department.

    According to the head of the UGCC, it should be recalled that the Ukrainian state in the first half of 2001 was in very sensitive circumstances. This was the second term of Leonid Kuchma's presidency: the disappearance of Georgy Gongadze, the "cassette" scandal, the beginning of the "Ukraine without Kuchma" movement, the scandal associated with the sale of weapons – "Kolchugas". That is, Ukraine was again being driven under the protectorate of Russia by certain actions on the part of Russia. And the Pope came and confirmed the independence and sovereignty of Ukraine as a free democratic state! Moreover, he encouraged Ukrainian youth to build a real independent Ukrainian state."

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    "When he arrived in Ukraine, he called himself a pilgrim, that is, he stressed that this visit has no political overtones – he wanted to express his respect for the Christians of Ukraine of different faiths, for our history, our culture. But, on the other hand, he clearly outlined the borders of our country, he congratulated the Ukrainians, "from Simferopol and Odessa to Kharkiv, from Donetsk to Lviv." I would say today that the Pope publicly recognized the inviolability of the borders of the Ukrainian state. He then outlined the borders that we are fighting for today at the cost of the blood of our soldiers.

    Then, again, the entire international community paid attention to Ukraine. Through the visit of the Holy Father, Ukraine gained subjectivity. I think that even at this level – the level of respect for the statehood of Ukraine, its desire to build its future as a European independent state - all that was voiced and asserted by Pope John Paul II. We can say that the pope recognized and presented Ukraine in a new way not as a member of the CIS, but as a subject of international law," the head of the UGCC said.

    Patriarch Sviatoslav recalled several accents when John Paul II met with political, public and cultural figures and business representatives. He then clearly formulated the three principles of true democracy. The first principle is the recognition of higher values. As a Catholic, he spoke of God's truths, of God's authority. Because if a person has nothing sacred in his soul, he is disoriented. The second principle is respect for the dignity of the human person: without respect for a person, there is no democracy. And the third is that power should serve everyone, starting with the weakest and most needy.

    As we have already reported, these days Ukraine celebrates the 20th anniversary of the visit of St. John Paul II, Pope of Rome. The main events related to the celebration are held in Lviv from June 13 to 27, 2021. The culmination of the large-scale celebration will be the Episcopal Divine Liturgy on Sunday, June 27 (starting at 11:00), which will be celebrated by the head of the UGCC, His Beatitude Sviatoslav, on the Square in front of the Church of the Nativity of the Most Holy Theotokos (Lviv-Sykhiv).
    https://risu.ua/en/john-paul-ii-20-...s-being-shed-today---head-of-the-ugcc_n119440
     
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  18. Basto

    Basto Guest

    In honor of Ukraine and of Cardinal Josyf Slipyj, at the 130th anniversary of his birth (1892-2022) — by Roberto de Mattei

    There are men who embody the deepest virtues and values of a people. Such was Cardinal Josyf Slipyj, major archbishop of Halych and Lviv of the Ukrainians, the 130th anniversary of whose birth is being celebrated just as his homeland is experiencing an enormous new tragedy.

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    Born on February 17 1892 in Zazdrist, western Ukraine, at the age of nineteen Josyf Slipyj entered the seminary of Lviv, where he was ordained a priest on September 30 1917 and then sent to Rome to complete his studies at the Oriental Institute and the Gregorian University.

    In 1925 he was appointed rector of the seminary of Lviv and in 1929 of the theological academy of the same city. Ukraine had in the meantime fallen under the Soviet yoke, and Stalin, between 1932 and 1933, requisitioned all agricultural production to impose forced collectivization on the country through the famine known as Holodomor (cf. Anne Applebaum, Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine, Doubleday, New York 2017).

    As war drew near, the Greek-Catholic metropolitan of Ukraine, Andrey Sheptytsky (1865-1944), who had ordained him to the priesthood, asked Pius XII to appoint him as his coadjutor with the right of succession. So in 1939 Msgr. Josef Slipyj was made exarch of eastern Ukraine and at the death of Metropolitan Sheptytsky, on November 1 1944, became head and father of the Ukrainian Catholic Church. It was a terrible time for his country, caught in the grip of the Nazis and the Communists. On April 11 1945 Metropolitan Slipyj was arrested by the Soviets and sentenced to eight years of forced labor in the gulags, while an illegal synod was staged to proclaim the “reunification” of the Ukrainian Catholic Church with the Orthodox Patriarchate of Moscow, dominated by the Soviet regime. The churches of the Greek-Catholics, around 3,000, were given to the Orthodox and almost all the bishops and priests were killed or imprisoned. In 1953 Archbishop Slipyj received a second five-year sentence to Siberia and in 1958 a third to four years of forced labor. In 1962, at the age of seventy, he received his fourth sentence, consisting in deportation for life to the grim camp of Mordovia. In all, the heroic prelate spent 18 years in the prisons and gulags.

    The Jesuit father Pietro Leoni (1909-1995), a survivor of the Soviet concentration camps, describing the horrors of the Kivov transit camp, recounts that one day some prisoners were put in his cell. “At dusk I heard an unknown voice calling me: an elderly man, with a beard, was standing in front of my place; he offered me his hand and introduced himself: Josyf Slipyj. It was both a joy and a sorrow to know that I had been brought together with my metropolitan” (Msgr. Giovanni Choma, Josyf Slipyj, padre e confessore della Chiesa ucraina martire, La Casa di Matriona, Milan 2001, p. 68).

    Pius XII repeatedly intervened on behalf of the Ukrainians and their metropolitan, encouraging them to resist persecution, especially with the encyclical Orientales Omnes Ecclesias of December 23 1945. Nonetheless, in 1958, after the death of Pius XII, relations between Russia and the Vatican began to change. When John XXIII announced Vatican Council II, he wanted representatives of the Moscow Patriarchate to take part in it. The Kremlin authorities imposed the condition that the Council remain silent on communism. A secret agreement was signed in August of 1962 in the French town of Metz between Cardinal Tisserant, representing the Vatican, and the Orthodox bishop Nikodim on the Russian side. The grand assembly convened to discuss the problems of its time would be silent on the greatest political catastrophe of the twentieth century (R. de Mattei, The d Vatican Council. An unwritten story, Loreto Publishing, Fitzwilliam, NH, 2012, pp. 149-151).

    In those years the communist gulags overflowed with prisoners sentenced for religious reasons, especially from the Ukrainian Catholic Church. It would have been a scandal if the bishops who were victims of persecution had been absent from the Council hall while the Moscow Patriarchate was instead represented by delegates who supported the butchers. A negotiation was therefore held between the Holy See and the Kremlin to allow Metropolitan Slipyj to participate in the Council. The head of the Ukrainian Church did not want to leave his country, but obeyed the pope and before leaving Moscow secretly consecrated as bishop the Ukrainian Redemptorist priest Wasyl Welyckowskyj.

    He arrived in Rome on February 9 1963, but did not remain silent. On October 11 1963 Slipyj spoke at the Council of Ukrainian Church’s witness of blood and proposed that the see of Kiev-Halych be raised to the patriarchal rank. He recalls having addressed this request numerous times to Paul VI but always being refused for political reasons. The recognition of the Ukrainian Patriarchate would in fact have hindered Ostpolitik and the ecumenical dialogue with the Orthodox Church of Moscow (Memorie, Ukrainian Catholic University, Lviv-Rome 2018, pp. 512-513). However, on January 25 1965 he was made a cardinal by Pope Paul VI, who raised the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church to the rank of major archbishopric of Lviv of the Ukrainians.

    Between 1968 and 1976, despite his advanced age, Cardinal Slipyj undertook long and tiring journeys to the communities of the Ukrainian diaspora in the Americas, Australia, and Europe, continuing to play the role of pastor of his people. In 1976 he launched an appeal to the United Nations on behalf of the victims of communism and in 1977, in dramatic remarks before the Sakharov Tribunal, once again denounced religious persecution in Ukraine. The world looked to him and to Cardinal József Mindszenty (1892-1975) as to two great witnesses of the Catholic faith in the twentieth century.

    To ensure the future of the Ukrainian Church, Cardinal Slipyj did not shy away from extreme actions. Peter Kwasniewski recently recalled how on April 2 1977 he clandestinely ordained three bishops, without the authorization of Paul VI, automatically incurring the canonical censures provided for by can. 953 of the Code then in force. However, unlike what would happen for Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, excommunicated in 1986 for the same infringement of canon law, no measure was unleashed ipso facto against Cardinal Slipyj (https://onepeterfive.com/clandestin...ons-from-cardinal-wojtyla-and-cardinal-slipyj). One of the bishops he ordained was Msgr. Lubomyr Husar (1933-2017), whom John Paul II appointed, after Slipyj, major archbishop of the Greek-Catholic Church and cardinal. He was succeeded as primate by Sviatoslav Shevchuk, who at this moment finds himself under the bombs in the besieged city of Kiev. In 2004 the see of the major archbishopric was moved to Kiev and changed its name to the current one of Kiev-Halych.

    Cardinal Josef Slipyj died in exile in Rome at the age of ninety-two on September 7 1984, and is now buried in Lviv, in the crypt of St. George’s Cathedral, next to Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytsky. John Paul II called him “a man of unconquered faith, a pastor of firm courage, a witness of heroic fidelity, an eminent personality of the Church” (L'Osservatore Romano, October 19 1984).

    While the religious and political identity of his land is once again being brutally trampled, the memory of the heroic resistance of Cardinal Josyf Slipyj helps us to be trustful for the future of Ukraine. Kiev was the place of the conversion of the Russian people to the Catholic Church, and it is from Kiev, not Moscow, that the second great conversion of Russia announced by Our Lady at Fatima is destined to begin. Cardinal Slipyj was a great devotee of the message of Fatima. In 1980 he presented John Paul II with two million signatures collected by the Blue Army, insisting in a long conversation with the pope on the need to consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary (John Haffert, Dear Bishop! Memoirs of the Author Concerning the History of the Blue Army, AMI International Press, Washington 1982, p. 229). This consecration has not yet taken place in the manner required by the Most Blessed Virgin, whom Cardinal Slipyj addressed in his testament as follows: “Seated on the sled and making my way to eternity...I recite a prayer to our protector and Queen of Heaven, the ever Virgin Mother of God. Take our Ukrainian Church and our Ukrainian people under your sure protection!” ( Memoirs, pp. 524-525).

    Making his words our own at this tragic moment in the history of the world, we cannot help but proclaim aloud: “Honor to Cardinal Slipyj and to his martyred people.”

    https://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2022/03/in-honor-of-ukraine-and-of-cardinal.html#more
     
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  19. Basto

    Basto Guest

    The head of the Polish bishops’ conference has done what Pope Francis has avoided doing by publicly condemning Russia’s invasion of Ukraine

    ROME -- The head of the Polish bishops’ conference has done what Pope Francis has so far avoided doing: He publicly condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and urged the head of the Russian Orthodox Church to use his influence with Vladimir Putin to demand an end to the war and for Russian soldiers to stand down.

    “The time will come to settle these crimes, including before the international courts," Archbishop Stanislaw Gądecki warned in his March 2 letter to Patriarch Kirill. “However, even if someone manages to avoid this human justice, there is a tribunal that cannot be avoided.”

    Gądecki’s tone was significant because it contrasted sharply with the comparative neutrality of the Vatican and Francis to date. The Holy See has called for peace, humanitarian corridors, a cease-fire and a return to negotiations, and even offered itself as a mediator. But Francis has yet to publicly condemn Russia by name for its invasion or publicly appeal to Kirill, and the Vatican offered no comment on the Russian strike on Europe’s largest nuclear plant that sparked a fire Friday.

    For a pope who has declared the mere possession of nuclear weapons immoral and cautioned against using atomic energy because of the environmental threat posed by radiation leaks, the silence was even more notable.
    [...]

    https://abcnews.go.com/Internationa...shun-vaticans-moderate-stance-russia-83266891
     
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  20. Basto

    Basto Guest

    Ukraine is fighting. Ukraine is praying. Ukraine is serving.



     

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