(The Pillar. LUKE COPPEN).
The Vatican is considering a request to establish a fully fledged Ukrainian Greek Catholic diocese in Germany. The Vatican’s Dicastery for the Eastern Churches has asked the German bishops’ conference for its view on whether the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Apostolic Exarchate in Germany and Scandinavia should be upgraded to an eparchy, equivalent to a diocese. The move could have significant consequences for the Catholic Church in Germany, with the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church (UGCC) playing an enhanced role within the country’s bishops’ conference and wider Catholic life. The Synod of Bishops of the UGCC — the largest of the 23 Eastern Catholic Churches in full communion with Rome — decided at a September 2023 meeting in Rome to elevate the German exarchate to an eparchy, a step requiring Rome’s sign-off. Ukrainian Greek Catholic leader Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk referred to the decision at a May 26 celebration in Munich, marking the exarchate’s 65th anniversary. Speaking after a May 21-24 meeting of the UGCC’s Permanent Synod in the southern German city, Shevchuk said: “We submitted this decision to the consideration of the Holy Father Francis and now we want to confirm it once again at the end of the Permanent Synod of the UGCC.” “Sixty-five years of the exarchate is already a bit too much,” he added. “According to Church law, the exarchate is the embryo of the diocese. This is the first, temporary step.”