February 10, 1975
We acknowledge with prayer and with anguish the exchange visit to the United States of the group of churchmen from the Soviet Union at the invitation of the National Council of Churches.
Our prayer is that, witnessing the religious freedom practiced everywhere and by everyone in this nation, these churchmen, will strive upon their return to Russia to bring the reality of this same religious freedom to their land and to all her peoples.
Our anguish stems from the Russian Orthodox Church Synod of Zagorsk, U. S. S. R., which was held May 30 – June 2, 1971. This synod declared repealed the provisions of the Union of Uzhorod, which took place in Carpatho-Ruthenia, our ancestral homeland, on April 24, 1646. This Union was the initial act which brought back the Byzantine Rite Carpatho-Ruthenian clegry, Religious and faithful to union whith the Holy Apostolic See of Rome.
The Russian Orthodox Church first acted in opposition to the Union of Uzhorod locally when she declared this Union liquidated in the Diocese of Mukacevo on August 28, 1949, and in the Diocese of Presov on April 28, 1950. Mukacevo is now within the territorial limits of the U. S. S. R., while Presov is in Czechoslovakia. This liquidation in both instances was accomplished by deceit and force despite any claims of the Russian Orthodox Church to the contrary.
The best evidence of this deceit and force was the immediate resurgence of the Church of the Union of Uzhorod in the Diocese of Presov in the Spring of 1968 during the short-lived Dubcek government. Were there to be a similar combination of Spring and liberation in the Diocese of Mukacevo in the U. S. S. R., the Church of the Union of Uzhorod would emerge with equal rapidity and vigor.
Our loyalty to our people behind the Iron Curtain and our sharing in their intense longing to practice their Faith freely precludes any participation on our part in this visit of the Soviet churchmen.
Again, we pray that the true religious freedom which these guests of the National Council of Churches will witness in these United States will return with them as burning rays of light to the U. S. S. R.
With the bestowal of our episcopal blessings upon you, we are
Stephen J. Kocisko Archbishop of Munhall
Michael J. Dudick Bishop of Passaic
Emil J.Michalik Bishop of Parma
John M. Bilock Auxiliary Bishop of Munhall
