Waffen SS Galizien -Patriarch Josif Slipij

[Volodymyr]

In Kharkiv is now quite controversial about a small monument to so-called Patriarch Iosif Slipij, GrekoCatolic ierarch during Great War. This monument was pulled down by old Army veterans because Slipij was chaplain, spiritual head of and organizer of Nazi SS Divisia 14 Waffen SS Galizien.

Although Great War was difficult time- for a ierarch to collaborate with Fascists seems to be very evil. But also it is said here that Catolic Church is to canonize this man.

What of this is true? How to understand?

 

[Sepharad]

In Kharkiv is now quite controversial about a small monument to so-called Patriarch Iosif Slipij, GrekoCatolic ierarch during Great War. This monument was pulled down by old Army veterans because Slipij was chaplain, spiritual head of and organizer of Nazi SS Divisia 14 Waffen SS Galizien.

Although Great War was difficult time- for a ierarch to collaborate with Fascists seems to be very evil. But also it is said here that Catolic Church is to canonize this man.

What of this is true? How to understand?

I find this hard to believe! How could he have been a Catholic chaplain to a Nazi SS division? I thought the Nazis were anti-Catholic?

I have known a number of Byzantine Rite Catholics and not one of them was neo-Nazi or even antisemitic. I used to live right down the street from a large Byzantine Rite (Ruthenian) Catholic parish, and often attended their Slavic Festival…I got to know a lot of their members, and even the priest.

I cannot believe they would support anything like this, and I’d also read once that in the Ukraine, the “Greek Catholics” (Eastern Rite Catholics) and Jews would help shelter each other during times of Russian Orthodox rioting.

(BTW The term, “The Great War” in the USA anyway, means World War ONE. The Nazis were World War TWO, is that what you meant to say??)

 

[Sepharad]

I just looked him up to find out more…I could be wrong, I might not know all the details, but he sounds like he was a truly great man in many ways…anyone who can stand up to the ruthlessness of the former Communist regime is a hero in my book!

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josyf_Slipyj

 

[Hesychios]

I find this hard to believe! How could he have been a Catholic chaplain to a Nazi SS division? I thought the Nazis were anti-Catholic?

I know nothing of this particular claim, so I am not commenting on it directly.

I just want to point out that it is public history that Ukrainians were supporters (at least initially) of the German advance against the communist government. Many prison camps were staffed by Ukrainian guards.

The Germans were exploiting rifts in the communities they overpowered, it is nothing new. Also, Ukraine had suffered a terrible famine in the 1930’s, partly due to the disruption caused by introducing enforced collectivization and partly due to the resistance of the people, some of whom burned their crops in protest. The international community was aware of the crises, but Stalin would not permit foreign aid to assist the people of Ukraine. An estimated ten million died, in any country that’s a lot of people but in a country the size of Ukraine it is devastating.

As a result of these terrible circumstances, the Germans looked very much like liberators, especially early in the war before their own despicable horrors were to manifest. The first areas “liberated” were along the western edge of the country, right where the highest concentration of Greek Catholics reside. The number of volunteers from Ukraine into the German military was substantial, many of these were Greek Catholics and they would have had need of chaplains.

It should be noted that the German regular military did not ordinarily recruit foreigners, but the SS did.

I thought the Nazis were anti-Catholic?

They took advantage when possible, exploiting local animosities.

Ukrainians in the far west (Catholics true, but also some Orthodox were there) really hated Poles in general (who happened to be mostly Catholic), they tended to despise Jews (just like almost everyone else, including Poles and Russians) and they hated the Russians, who were essentially communists. It was a natural fit.

(BTW The term, “The Great War” in the USA anyway, means World War ONE. The Nazis were World War TWO, is that what you meant to say??)

For the peoples of the former Soviet Union the war against Hilter’s Nazi war machine was the Great War.

The United States of America lost approximately 3/10 of one percent of population in that war (one person out of every 3,333 people). The Soviet Union lost 13-7/10 percent of it’s population in the conflict, or one out of every seven.
*
Michael*

 

[edwest2]

Just a brief note. There were more foreigners in the other German branches of the Wehrmacht than in the Waffen SS:

ospreypublishing.com/title_detail.php/title=Q5243~ser=MAA~per=2

God bless,
Ed

 

[Freshman88]

I just want to point out that it is public history that Ukrainians were supporters (at least initially) of the German advance against the communist government. Many prison camps were staffed by Ukrainian guards.

And still hundreads of thousands of Ukrainains were sent to Germany for a life of slave-labour. You’re painting an unjust portrait of Ukrainians.

The Germans were exploiting rifts in the communities they overpowered, it is nothing new.

This is true, but there were also divisions who resisted both the Germans and the Russians.

Also, Ukraine had suffered a terrible famine in the 1930’s, partly due to the disruption caused by introducing enforced collectivization and partly due to the resistance of the people, some of whom burned their crops in protest. The international community was aware of the crises, but Stalin would not permit foreign aid to assist the people of Ukraine. An estimated ten million died, in any country that’s a lot of people but in a country the size of Ukraine it is devastating.

It is interesting that you glanced over the fact that the Soviets were seizing whole crops and created an artificial famine. The way you presented the Holodomor makes it sound as though the Kulaks brought it upon themselves, this to me sounds like communist propaganda.

As a result of these terrible circumstances, the Germans looked very much like liberators, especially early in the war before their own despicable horrors were to manifest. The first areas “liberated” were along the western edge of the country, right where the highest concentration of Greek Catholics reside. The number of volunteers from Ukraine into the German military was substantial, many of these were Greek Catholics and they would have had need of chaplains.

Exactly, I see no wrong in providing spiritual services to these men.

Ukrainians in the far west (Catholics true, but also some Orthodox were there) really hated Poles in general (who happened to be mostly Catholic), they tended to despise Jews (just like almost everyone else, including Poles and Russians) and they hated the Russians, who were essentially communists. It was a natural fit.

Unfortunately anti-antisemitism was common, but as you fairly pointed out antisemitism was not particular to the Ukrainians. Neither was hate against the Russians particular to the Ukrainians, nor of the Poles.

It is my experience that this kind of anti-Western Ukrainian/ anti-Eastern Catholic revisionism has its basis in communist propaganda and Russian/Orthodox nationalism. The destruction of this memorial is just further proof of this claim.

I am sick of participating in discussions of this nature because they usually lead to uncharitable posts, so I will leave this discussion.

Eternal Memory to Patriarch Josif Slipij!

 

[Freshman88]

I do not think he has been canonized yet. If that is the case, pray for his cause.

so-called Patriarch Iosif Slipij, GrekoCatolic ierarch during Great War.

There is no need for “so-called” he was indeed a Patriarch.

 

[Hesychios]

… You’re painting an unjust portrait of Ukrainians…

You must be Ukrainian.

 

[Hesychios]

There is no need for “so-called” he was indeed a Patriarch.

Not according to the Pope.

So then, what part of Ukraine are you from, anyway?

 

[Ridgerunner]

Though I am no expert on the Waffen SS, it is not greatly surprising to me that some Waffen SS divisions had chaplains. Initially, the SS were mightily encouraged in a sort of neo-paganism. But as the war went on, more and more of the Waffen SS were essentially nothing more than elite units of soldiers. Waffen SS were never quite the same thing as, e.g., the Totenkopf units that ran the camps, and grew less and less so. Some were even drafted straight into the Waffen SS. I recall reading about a group of seminarians that was drafted into the Waffen SS, though I think they all washed out eventually. There were not only German Waffen SS units, there were units of Ukrainians, Dutch, French, Belgian, Norwegians and others. With the various nationalities, the emphasis changed, so it was not quite the same to be a member of a German Waffen SS unit or a French Waffen SS unit. With the latter, the “Aryan” thing was played down and the “Save Europe from Bolshevism” theme was played up. They even used the image of Joan of Arc to motivate the French units. I once met the son of a Ukrainian Waffen SS soldier, and he told me that hatred of the Soviet system was the big part of the theme with them. They didn’t care a whole lot for the Germans, but after the Terror Famine, they would do anything to get back at the Soviets and defeat them. If I am not greatly mistaken, there were even Bosnian Muslim units. Toward the end, the SS just grabbed manpower wherever they could get it, and didn’t insist on ideology very much at all. Generally speaking, the Waffen SS were kept away from the death camps. The Waffen SS were trained as soldiers, and were by and large treated as soldiers in every way. Units like the Totenkopf were not.

I greatly doubt that Sliyipi (sp?) could have been an “organizer” of an SS unit. Himmler was very jealous of his domination of the SS, and virulently anti-Catholic.

 

[Peter_J]

Hi Freshman,

There is no need for “so-called” he was indeed a Patriarch.

If so, then:

• At what point did the UGCC become a Patriarchal Church?
• Is it still one today?

 

[Freshman88]

Hi Freshman,

If so, then:

• At what point did the UGCC become a Patriarchal Church?
• Is it still one today?

988 a.d. and yes.

 

[Hesychios]

Hi Freshman,

Interesting.

 

[Peter_J]

988 a.d. and yes.

Well that was unexpected (the “988 a.d.” that is, not the “yes”).

In that case, perhaps you could share your knowledge with us a little further, and tell us how old the UGCC is?

 

[Peter_J]

P.S. Also, have any churches split off from the UGCC? If so, which churches, and when?

 

[ASimpleSinner]

In Kharkiv is now quite controversial about a small monument to so-called Patriarch Iosif Slipij, GrekoCatolic hierarch during Great War. This monument was pulled down by old Army veterans because Slipij was chaplain, spiritual head of and organizer of Nazi SS Divisia 14 Waffen SS Galizien.

Although Great War was difficult time- for a hierarch to collaborate with Fascists seems to be very evil. But also it is said here that Catolic Church is to canonize this man.

I feel the same way about collaboration or working with the communist butchers that managed to starve and kill and destroy members of both our churches. But let’s note, I put the emphasis on seems, and am willing to do more to take a look at it rather than take the situation at the polemic claims.

I can’t really speak to the truth of the claims. On face value, I suspect them to be rather dubious, and if their is any truth in any way to them, I am willing to bet the house that it is being twisted to paint the venerable Blessed Iosif in the worst light for polemical purposes. It rather reminds me of the ludicrous headlines that put out there when Ratzinger was elected pope “Former Nazi soldier becomes pope” because he was - like all other “Aryan Germans” compelled to join the Hitler Youth and - in the final days of the war - was given a rifle like EVERY German man who could fire one.

Not to throw stones, but only to point out, the ROC itself at times had to work with the state to even survive. I recall that the Communists made an offer to allow for limited church re-openings and limited freedoms in exchange for ROC support during the time of the Second World War.

Before that, beleagured believers alternately often saw Germans as liberators, or were despondant and disinterested in fighting for a state that was fighting them. (“We just killed your grandmother who became a nun when she was widowed, and sent your priest to the gulag, closed your church, blew it up, and no one has heard from your bishop in months - Now fight for us!” What the heck would you do?) Given what I know of the situation - I was not there - I don’t blame the hierarchs that accepted these offers for the very existence of their flock. I would not dream of painting the men who did so as some sort of collaborationist traitors. That is utter foolishness.

My question is why now have these aged veterans of the Great Patriotic War all of the sudden come forward (as though this were spontaneous) to vandalize? More directly, what agendas does this vandalism REALLY promote? I don’t for a second believe that this is some spontaneous surge in nationalistic pride that a dozen or so septugenarians and octogenarians did on their own without prompting… This is clearly intended to promote ill-will and some greater agenda.

Who is really behind this attack? Who is pulling the strings?

 

[antgaria]

Dear all,

I’ve read a bit of history in my younger days soo soo long ago. One thing to keep in mind along with what others have brought up is that the world was not so “internety” back then.

I’ve read accounts about how when the Germans in von Kleist’s panzer group were advancing through that region, they were encountering villages and towns which had not encountered Germans since the First World War. After what they had been encountering in the Soviet Union, these German units were welcomed almost as old friends come back to re-establish what had long since not been. A lot of these people probably had no idea what they were welcoming. Field Marshal von Kleist himself was, from accounts I’ve read, a old-school style Prussian general who did not share the Nazi qualities that could have warned the local populations.

Sorry… I don’t know too much about the UGCC… trying to learn as much as I can about it. I wanted to throw out that tid bit and mention how hindsight is not always the mirror of what those people would have seen at the time.

God bless,
Anthony

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

I find this hard to believe! How could he have been a Catholic chaplain to a Nazi SS division? I thought the Nazis were anti-Catholic?

I have known a number of Byzantine Rite Catholics and not one of them was neo-Nazi or even antisemitic. I used to live right down the street from a large Byzantine Rite (Ruthenian) Catholic parish, and often attended their Slavic Festival…I got to know a lot of their members, and even the priest.

I cannot believe they would support anything like this, and I’d also read once that in the Ukraine, the “Greek Catholics” (Eastern Rite Catholics) and Jews would help shelter each other during times of Russian Orthodox rioting.

(BTW The term, “The Great War” in the USA anyway, means World War ONE. The Nazis were World War TWO, is that what you meant to say??)

In principle, it’s not impossible, because there was a certain amount of “fraternatisation” (it’s the only word I can think of offhand) between Catholics & Nazis.​

An example of this is that Reinhard Heydrich (“Butcher” Heydrich as he was rightly known) was buried with RC rites. Even in Germany itself, the Catholic bishops were not all of them uncompromisingly hostile to the Reich: one is known to have sat in the Reichstag throughout the War; though von Galen & some other staunch anti-Nazis are probably better known.

In case Pius XII And All That is mentioned: he was just one bishop, however influential; his activities & sympathies & intentions can’t be universalised & applied to all the other bishops on the Continent: what the other bishops did or did not do, & why, good or bad or neither, cannot be found by looking to the Pope. Bishops, like everyone else, have to deal with the circumstances in which they find themselves.

AFAICS the issue is whether or not Slipyi fraternised with the Nazis, & if so, in what way or ways. There are many degrees of discretion & of valour, & it is not always clear whether the Reich was being tolerated to some extent to avoid worse evils, or whether it was being enthusiastically supported as a protection against Jews or Communists or Soviet invaders. We have the benefit of hindsight: Christians in the 30s & 40s did not.

Maybe his nationalism took the form of friendliness with to an army which was invading a part of Europe which had been invaded by the Bolsheviks. He would not have been the only person or the only cleric to infer from the hatred of the Nazis for Communism that the victims of Communism had something to hope for from the Nazis.

This speaks for itself:

• In Lwow, based on death lists drawn up in advance by Ukrainian nationalists, executions of Poles by local Ukrainian nationalist groups abounded. At the headquarters of the Ukrainian police on Lozinski Street several thousands of Poles were imprisoned, tortured and murdered with unspeakable cruelty. (An eye witness account appeared in the London Dziennik Polski). Eminent Polish scholars from the centuries old John
  Casimir University were rounded up and executed by the Nazis. (see W Zelenski, “Jeszcze o zabojstwie Pierackiego i rozrachunkach polsko-ukrainskich”, 46 Zeszyty Historyczne, 1978, pages 157-8) A similar fate befell the remnants of the Polish intelligentsia in Stanislawow, when in August 1941, the Ukrainian militia rounded up 120 Poles and handed them over to the German Gestapo for execution. (see J. Zielinski, “Stanislawow -1941”, Tygodnik Powszechny, No. 49(567), December 6, 1959)
  The fate of the Jews was, if anything, worse:
  In Lvov, where several thousand Jews had been murdered (by the Ukrainians) at the beginning of July (1941), there had been a pause in the killing… But on July 25, the local Ukrainians launched the “Petlura action”, a three day orgy of killing to “avenge” the murder of Simon Petlura by Shalom Schwarzbard, fifteen years before. Thousands of men and women were seized ostensibly for forced labour. Most were taken to a prison in the city, where they were beaten to death. Hundreds disappeared without trace. At least two thousand were killed. (M. Gilbert, The Holoucast, page 173)
  There was no effective opposition to stop or contain these excesses. Archbishop Metropolitan Szeptycki, the head of the Uniate (Ukrainian) Catholic Church, signed, together with four other Ukrainian nationalist leaders, a letter to Adolf Hitler stating: “We assure Your Excellency that the leading circles in the Ukraine are prepared to collaborate with Germany in a most close way, so as to conduct - with the united forces of the German and Ukrainian people - the struggle against the common enemy and to establish the New Order in the Ukraine and in all of Eastern Europe”.
  Lots more here:
• [http://imperium.lenin.ru/~verbit/scs/cranks/viznyuk.scs (http://imperium.lenin.ru/~verbit/scs/cranks/viznyuk.scs)
  Depicting people as unambiguously heroic or evil does not really help towards understanding something as confused as WW2.

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

In Kharkiv is now quite controversial about a small monument to so-called Patriarch Iosif Slipij, GrekoCatolic ierarch during Great War. This monument was pulled down by old Army veterans because Slipij was chaplain, spiritual head of and organizer of Nazi SS Divisia 14 Waffen SS Galizien.

Although Great War was difficult time- for a ierarch to collaborate with Fascists seems to be very evil. But also it is said here that Catolic Church is to canonize this man.

What of this is true? How to understand?

That’s right - both he & his immediate predecessor, Metropolitan Szeptycki, are being considered for canonisation.​

I think I can see why this bothers you - I don’t think it is hard to understand. Cardinal Slipyi certainly paid for what he did: he was imprisoned by the Bolsheviks from 1945 to 1963, so his life did not come to a standstill in 1945.

That is not a defence - it may help to bear the Patriarch Tikhon in mind. Bolshevism was at least as diabolical as Nazism, but the ghastliness of a tyranny does not exempt churchmen from having to decide how to face it. The “obviously heroic” course would be to defy it, no matter what: this may be appropriate in some instances. But when the result of such defiance is likely to be trouble for others, what does one do ? Bishops do not have the luxury enjoyed by private individuals - these individuals can
act without others being inconvenienced; bishops may not be able to. Especially if they lack freedom to consult with others, or are blackmailed by skilful liars (such as the Bolsheviks & Nazis were).

IMHO, it was more heroic, not less, of the Patriarch of Moscow to “collaborate” with the Bolsheviks (whom God has now destroyed), for to do so when one could be openly defiant & be killed in consequence would have been far easier; what he did, was not as “showy”, & was certain to lead to misunderstanding. ISTM that Cardinal Slipyi had to make a very similar choice, which led to all sorts of ambiguities. But if the Patriarch of Moscow is to be considered sympathetically - & surely he ought to be - then how does the same not apply to Cardinal Slipyi ?

Life is messy, so moral choices are often not as clear-cut as might be desired; yet they have to be made, even when different courses of action may well be difficult to live with or to defend. There is also the danger of being so concerned not to be shallow & condemnatory that one finishes by trying to defend what is indefensible, rather than understanding it. ISTM we should not throw mud at others for their decisions unless we have faced their temptations & difficulties. If this makes mutual mud-slinging a bit harder, so much the better

I hope the others can tell you more

 

[Sepharad]

My paternal grandparents were born in the Ukraine (in Belaya Tserkov, not too far from the city of Kiyev). They were Jews. They came to the USA in 1903 to escape Tsarist pogroms and attacks by the Ukrainians they had to live with. So I know from the stories my grandparents told me, how antisemitic many Ukrainians are, that has never been any secret to me.

But I also know how brutal Communism has been, and is. I know what the Communists did to the people of Eastern Europe, to the Cubans, to the South Vietnamese, and what they are doing right now in China to the Tibetans.

And I wonder if maybe Slipjyi saw the Nazis as being “not as bad” as the Reds. Of course he would have been wrong, but perhaps he saw the Nazis as their liberators from Communism?