“Ukrainian society knows that His Beatitude Lubomyr is the one sent by God in order to testify to God’s fatherly care,” UGCC Head

“Today we celebrate our father, His Beatitude Lubomyr who on this day is celebrating two glorious anniversaries – his 80^th birthday and the 55^th anniversary of his priesthood.   The life of our Church Father -- Lubomyr Husar – is steeped in profound content.  I would characterize his life path by a phrase that God’s Son says to His Father: ‘All that is Mine – is Yours.  I am in You and You are in Me,’” stated His Beatitude Sviatoslav (Shevchuk) , UGCC Head, during the sermon (audiovideo) at the Pontifical Divine Liturgy on the occasion of the jubilee of His Beatitude Lubomyr (Husar) UGCC Archbishop Emeritus.  The Divine Liturgy was held on February 26, 2013 in St. George’s Archcathedral in Lviv.

As the Church Primate said, His Beatitude Lubomyr is known in the community as “a person in whom God exists and speaks to us, who has nothing of his own, but all is God’s.”  “His words are strong and mighty in today’s Ukrainian society.  When the timber of his voice sounds on radio or TV, everyone grows quiet, because the Father is speaking.  Therefore, our youth awaits His Beatitude so eagerly, even though it normally does not interest itself greatly with the life of the elderly,” said the preacher.  Additionally, noted the UGCC Major Archbishop, the Ukrainian community comprehends that His Beatitude Lubomyr is specifically the one whom God sends as the one who should testify to God’s fatherhood on earth.

According to him, today’s Kyiv sociologists  believe that about one-percent of Greek-Catholics reside in Kyiv, yet the number of people in Kyiv who trust Lubomyr Husar number close to a quarter of the population.

UGCC is convinced that there are many people who for certain reasons never met their fathers but throughout their lives have yearned to see his face, search for him, in order to, at least for a moment, see the one who gave them life.  This yearning is connected with the deep desire of a person to know who they are, their roots, and thereby to comprehend that which awaits them tomorrow.  “To know a father is a deep yearning that God placed in the human heart and the highest level of hierarchical service of Our Savior is to show God the Father to a person. Then, when we meet in our life the Heavenly Father, we can say that the gates of eternal life have been opened to us.” concluded UGCC Head.

Immediately following the Divine Liturgy, Bishop Bohdan (Dziurakh), UGCC Synod of Bishops Secretary, read the greeting to His Beatitude Lubomyr from Archbishop Leonardo Sandri, Roman Catholic Cardinal, Diplomat of the Apostolic Sea and the Prefect of the Congregation of Eastern Churches.  “It gives me great pleasure to review how much God’s Providence has allowed you to fulfill during the many years of your service in his vineyard after being ordained a priest on March 30,1958 in the Stamford Eparchy in Connecticut, USA.   As a professor at the eparchial seminary in Stamford, then as a pastor in Kerhonkson and finally as a student at the Pontifical Urabaniana University, you, Your Excellency, were preparing yourself for benevolent and competent service in the Church, combined with a monastic calling as a Studite, whose superior you became at the Studion Studite Monastery in Grottaferati.

The dignity of a bishop added new strength and zealousness to that fervor by which you had already distinguished yourself, continues the letter of His Excellency Leonardo Sandri.  Over the decades, as the Cardinal writes, UGCC Major Archbishop Emeritus led the Church with zeal, wisdom, benevolence and with his great moral and spiritual authority, a fidelity to the Eastern tradition and in unity with the Successor of Saint Apostle Peter,  inspired the Synod of Bishops and the whole congregation of the faithful as well as all Ukrainian people.  “I join you in your joy and gratitude to God for the gift of life and health and in expressing my greetings, I am joined by the Archbishop-Secretary, his assistant and the colleagues of the Congregation of Eastern Churches.  Once again I profess my great respect for you and assure you of prayers for your intentions to Our Lord and imploring Him to bestow upon you generous blessings for many long years,” states in his letter the Prefect of the Congregation of Eastern Churches.

Then His Beatitude Lubomyr addressed the audience with gratitude for the joint prayer and with the thought that each one of us should contemplate what the Creator gives us in life.

“Today we celebrate an event for which one can only be thankful.  I was born eighty years ago – that in itself is God’s gift.  Yes, God also gave me that, which with His assistance, I was capable of doing.  That is not my achievement – it is a gift from God.  God gives us a calling, a mind and free will, in order to be able to act,” emphasized His Beatitude Lubomyr.

In conclusion, the current UGCC Primate thanked the bishops of the Metropolitan Synod who gathered to honor “in a son-like fashion” their Father, Bishop Sofron (Mudryi), Archbishop Emeritus of UGCC Ivano-Frankivsk Metropolitanate, who will celebrate his ninetieth birthday this year, Bishop Nil (Lushchak), Auxiliary Bishop of the Eparchy of Mukachiv, who for the first time participated in the work of the synod, the Head of the Lviv Region Administration and the Lviv City Mayor and all representatives of  government for their joint prayer.

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