9 October 2003
Uniate Church marks 407th anniversary of Union of Brest-Litovsk
Belarus' Uniate Church marked the 407th anniversary of the Union of Brest-Litovsk on October 6.
The Union of Brest-Litovsk is the 1596 agreement whereby several million Ukrainians and Belarusian Orthodox Christians living under Polish rule in the Grand Duchy of Litva acknowledged the Roman pope as supreme in matters of faith.
Initiated by the Polish Orthodox clergy, the union was based on mutual concessions: the Orthodox Church retained its own liturgy, discipline and rite.
Polish King Zygmunt Waza viewed the union as a way of spiritually uniting lords and clergymen in the Grand Duchy while pursuing Poland's foreign and domestic policy and a means to jointly fight the reformation.
The agreement was met with opposition from part of the Orthodox nobility and clergy.
Pope Clement VIII approved the terms of the union between November 1595 and February 1596. A convocation in Brest on October 6-10, 1596 gave the document its final approval. On October 9, the union was solemnly proclaimed in the St. Nicholas Church, located at the site of the present-day Brest Fortress Memorial. The unified church was named the Uniate or Greek Catholic Church.
Most of the Orthodox Christians population accepted the union, although there were some conflicts. The Uniate Church was outlawed on the Belarusian territory by the Polotsk Church Convocation in 1839, and in Ukraine by Joseph Stalin in 1946.
The Uniate Church revived in Western Belarus in the 1920s, but was dissolved by the Soviet government in 1940. In the early 1990s, a Uniate community emerged in Brest. There is a Uniate church there at present.
Historians have split on the Union of Brest, some calling it a destructive event and some acknowledging Uniatism as Belarus' national faith. Kastus Kalinowski, leader of the anti-Russian uprising of 1863-1864, held the latter view. A source at the St. Peter and Paul Church in Brest told BelaPAN that the local Uniates did not plan to stage any festivities
on the occasion.
There is still no memorial sign on the site of the former St. Nicholas Church. The Uniate community wanted to start excavations on the territory of the Brest Fortress Memorial, but were banned from doing it by the local authorities.
http://brestonline.com/en/news/news470.html