Lviv History of Religion Museum opens exhibition about rescue of Jews by Greek Catholic clergy during war
The history of Lviv is the history of a mini-state in which for centuries live different peoples with their own histories and cultures, with their customs and religions. The exhibition “Those Who Saved the World” on 36 Staroyevreyska Street is a small story about the people of the Jewish quarter. The exhibition will open on June 27, at three o'clock.
The exhibit was created by the Lviv Museum of the History of Religion and is dedicated to the actions of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church (UGCC) in saving Jews during WWII, the head of the information department of the Lviv Museum of the History of Religion Iryna Tsebenko told RISU.
The direct organizers of the actions to save the Jews were the Sheptytsky brothers UGCC Metropolitan Andrey and Archimandrite Clement. Hundreds of Jews, including many children, hid in male and female monasteries of the UGCC. Monks, priests, and the faithful of the church risked their own lives to save Jews, revealing their attitudes toward them on the basis of the Christian principle of love, on the ideology of universal unity.
The focus of the exhibition is on the Holocaust and the Righteous. A few parts of the exhibit show different aspects of Jewish life in prewar Lviv. One section is dedicated to European politicians and philosophers who contributed to the emergence of the anti-Semitic element in the ideology of the Nazis.
The exhibition includes documentary materials, photographs of priests, nuns and monks, and rescued Jews – direct participants in these events; certificates and medals of people declared Righteous among the Nations, their personal belongings.
There are also parts of the exhibit devoted to Blessed Omelyan Kovch and to Lviv residents who saved Jews.
As of January 1, 2011, 2,363 citizens of Ukraine have the title Righteous among the Nations. They were awarded diplomas and medals with the engraved text: “Whoever saves a life is considered as if he has saved an entire world.”
