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Josyf Slipyj succeeded Andrey Sheptytsky as metropolitan archbishop of Lviv and head of the Ukrainian Catholic Church. He was arrested and imprisoned in 1945 with other Church leaders as part of the Soviet attempt to eliminate the Ukrainian Catholic Church. He spent a total of 18 years imprisoned in various gulags.In 1946, the Soviets convoked the sham “Synod of Lviv” in an attempt to force Ukrainian Catholics to join the Russian Orthodox Church. Slipyj rejected every forced attempt to have him break union with Rome and suffered greatly for it at the hands of his Soviet captors. In 1978, at the inauguration of Pope John Paul II, the Pope rose to greet Slipyj in a gesture of honor that broke protocol.
In an address given on Oct. 17, 1978, Slipyj wrote, “We Ukrainians rejoice in the election of a Slavic Pope … because, as a member of the suffering Polish Church, he knows what it means to suffer, to be persecuted, to have no rights. He knows what atheistic communism is, and he also knows what it is to thirst for the truth.”
Slipyj was named Major Archbishop in 1963, a title created for Slipyj, and a cardinal two years later. His cause for canonization is ongoing. His is an example of patient endurance and suffering with grace.
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