St John Paul II elected the holy patron of Polish-Ukrainian reconciliation
On October 11, 2017, during the prayer service to St. Josaphat at the grave of St. John Paul II in St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican, Rome, celebrations began on the occasion of the presentation of the reconciliation awards, the Polish-Ukrainian Capitula of 2017.
According to the Vatican Radio, the prayer service was celebrated in Ukrainian, Polish, English, and Italian.
The prayer service was led by the Patriarch Sviatoslav (Shevchuk) of the UGCC. His Beatitude Sviatoslav solemnly proclaimed St. John Paul II the heavenly patron of the “spiritual path of Polish-Ukrainian reconciliation.”
Concelebrating to Patriarch Sviatoslav were Dr Stefan Batruh, Pastor of the UGCC from Lublin, who heads the Foundation for the Spiritual Culture of the Frontier, and Fr. Genesio Viomar, OSBM, Proto-Archimandrite of the Basilian Order of St. Josaphat.
In the sermon, the Head of the UGCC recalled the ways of Polish-Ukrainian reconciliation, initiated by Pope John Paul II, in particular, the 30th anniversary of the meeting in Rome of representatives of the Episcopate of Poland and the Synod of the Greek Catholic Church (8 and 17 October 1987), during which, for the first time after the Second World War, the Declaration of Polish-Ukrainian Forgiveness and Reconciliation was officially proclaimed.
The Polish-Ukrainian Capitula was set up in 2000 with the blessing of His Beatitude Lubomyr Husar and Metropolitan of Peremisko-Warsaw, Archbishop Ioan Martyniak and Cardinal Henryk Roman Gulbinowic, at the Ecumenical House of Social Assistance of the Congregation for the Servants of the Immaculate Virgin Mary in Pralkivtsi (Poland).
The purpose of its establishment was to develop a new model of Polish-Ukrainian relations and to spread the values that these two peoples share. It includes many well-known personalities from Ukraine and Poland, as well as representatives of the Greek Catholic and Roman Catholic Episcopate.
The Capitula Award is conferred on individuals and institutions that are involved in the process of understanding between the peoples of Central and Eastern Europe, in a special way, between Poles and Ukrainians. The first award is a statuette featuring woven flowers cornflower and poppy symbolizing the peoples having a shared history – it was awarded to Pope John Paul II in the Vatican, another one –in 2001 during his visit to Ukraine. Cornflower and poppy grow side by side, in one land, and sometimes their roots are interwoven, which symbolizes the relations of Poles and Ukrainians. When representatives of the secretariat of the Honorary Capitula Award met in the Vatican with the Pope John Paul II, awarding him the distinction, the Holy Father joked: “How do you know whom every flower belongs to?”
Since 2003, the distinction of the Polish-Ukrainian Reconciliation was conferred on Ivan V. Vakarchuk, the rector of Ivan Franko National University of Lviv and Professor Jerzy Kluczkowski, famous historians and journalists Mykola Ryabchuk and Jacek Kuron, as well as the Ukrainian-Polish battalion, detached with a peacekeeping mission to the former Yugoslavian province of Kosovo, journalist Pavlo Smolensky and art historian Ivan Voznytskyy, former Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Poland Daniel Rotfeld and academician of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine Yaroslava Isayevych, as well as the editorial teams of Tygodnik Powszechny from Krakow and “Krytyky” from Kyiv, well-known Polish director Jerzy Hoffman and prominent Ukrainian actor Bogdan Stupka and other journalists, public figures, historians, directors, artists, newspaper editors, cultural institutions, presidium of the Conference of the Polish Episcopate, Catholic news agencies.
