Union of Uzhhorod


The Union of Uzhhorod, also referred to as Union of Ungvár, was the 1646 decision of 63 Ruthenian Orthodox priests from the south slopes of the Carpathian Mountains, then within the Kingdom of Hungary, to join the Catholic Church on terms similar to the Union of Brest from 1596 in the lands of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. The modern result of this union is the Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church.

History

Signed in the Castle of Ungvár on April 24 by the Roman Catholic bishop of Eger, György Jakusics, the union was initiated on the Ruthenian side by the Basilian monastic order under the leadership of the monk Petro Parfenii. The agreement allowed that the Eastern Byzantine church rite would be preserved and that the new "Uniate" priests would be elevated to the status of Roman Catholic clergy. As Orthodox clergy their status had been that of vassals with the requisite feudal duties.
The Basilian monks, led by Parfenii, agreed to the Union of Ungvár based on the following understandings:
An original copy of the Union was discovered in May 2016, a half page in length followed by a page and a half of signatures of the local priests seeking full communion with the local Catholic Church. The Union is again documented in a petition dated January 16, 1652 in which six archdeans petition Vatican to confirm Petro Parfenii as the bishop of Munkács.
The Union was approved by the Synod in Tyrnov, however the Vatican did not ratify these conditions at that time, because Parfenii was an orthodox bishop. Only in 1655, when Rome made Parfenii its bishop of Munkács did the Union extend to the East. By 1721, the Union encompassed the entire Carpathian region.
In 1949, Soviet authorities "revoked" the Union, creating the Orthodox Eparchy of Mukachiv-Uzhhorod, under the Patriarch of Moscow. In the late 1980s the Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church was re-established in Transcarpathia, following the easing of Soviet religious persecution.