In the late sixteenth century, during the early modern period, Christianity in Europe was undergoing significant religious and cultural change. The Protestant Reformation and the Catholic Reform raised new theological questions and challenges. At the same time, the spread of the printing press created a communications revolution, allowing ideas to circulate more rapidly between Western Europe and the Christian East.
The bishops of the Kyivan Metropolitanate, encompassing Ukrainian and Belarusian lands, were searching for ways to strengthen the life of their Church and respond to these challenges. The Patriarchate of Constantinople, under Ottoman rule, was itself in a weakened position and could provide limited support. At the same time, the bishops of the Kyivan Metropolitanate sought Christian unity.
During a series of synods in the 1590s, the bishops considered restoring communion with Rome while preserving their Eastern Christian tradition, liturgy, spirituality, and ecclesiastical identity.
These discussions led to the Union of Brest in 1596.
The Union, however, was not accepted by all the bishops. Hedeon Balaban, Bishop of Lviv, and Mykhail Kopystensky, Bishop of Przemyśl, opposed the Union. As a result, the Eparchy of Przemyśl did not enter into communion with Rome together with the other eparchies that accepted the Union in 1596.
For nearly the next century, the situation in the Przemyśl Eparchy remained complicated. Orthodox and Uniate hierarchies competed for ecclesiastical authority and control of the cathedral, administration, clergy, and parishes.
A decisive figure in this history was Bishop Inokentii Vynnytsky.
Vynnytsky became Orthodox Bishop of Przemyśl in 1680. According to the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, he secretly joined the Uniate Church in 1681, but did not immediately make his decision public.
The decisive change came in 1691. The transfer of the existing Uniate bishop of Przemyśl, I. Malakhovsky, removed an important obstacle to Vynnytsky's position and opened the way for the unification of the eparchy under a single hierarchy.
The process culminated in the formal acceptance of the Union by the whole Przemyśl Eparchy. Thus, 1691 represents a decisive turning point in the history of the Przemyśl Eparchy and its transition toward full communion with Rome.
The history of Przemyśl also demonstrates that the Union of Brest was not a single event completed in 1596. The process of restoring communion with Rome developed differently across the eparchies of the Kyivan Metropolitanate and, in the case of Przemyśl, continued for almost a century.
The Przemyśl Eparchy was one of the ancient eparchies of the Kyivan ecclesiastical tradition, with its origins reaching back to the period of Kyivan Rus’. Its later history became closely connected with the development of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church.
Today, this tradition continues in the Ukrainian Catholic Archeparchy of Przemyśl-Warsaw, which was elevated to the status of a metropolitan archeparchy in 1996 and is headed by Metropolitan Archbishop Eugeniusz Popowicz (Yevhen Popovych).
Keys:
1596 — Union of Brest.
Mykhail Kopystensky, Bishop of Przemyśl, opposed the Union in 1596.
Orthodox and Uniate hierarchies subsequently competed for authority in the Przemyśl Eparchy.
1680 — Inokentii Vynnytsky becomes Orthodox Bishop of Przemyśl.
1681 — Vynnytsky secretly accepts the Union.
1691 — A decisive turning point toward the union of the Przemyśl Eparchy with Rome.
The Przemyśl case demonstrates that the Union of Brest developed as a long historical process, rather than being completed everywhere in 1596.
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