Private audience with the Holy Father

                                                                                                                                       Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone

                                        State Secretary of Vatican

Your Eminence,

we turn to You with a request, if You could mediate our private audience with the Holy Father. The reason is that the situation is serious and according to the canon law the only person who can treat it is the Holy Father.

You can understand that we cannot accept various decrees from the Congregation for the Oriental Churches, nor even from the Vatican State Secretariate – even if they were signed by the Holy Father himself.

For instance, the President signs hundreds of letters daily and he does not even read many of them, all is executed by his chancellery. The seal and the signatures are at the disposal of the concerned and these people practically give replies in his name.

In this case, however, the matter is so serious that even among Your officials there could arise various negative influences, for not all of them are loyal to You and many times they do the opposite of what You want. This is known about Vatican dicasteries.

Besides, we have personal experience with the officials from the Congregation for the Oriental Churches. They have by now committed several crimes and likewise act in the name of the Holy Father (e.g. dissolution of the OSBM Czech Delegature in 2004).

In Ukraine it was:

1)      In 1992, dissolution of true Catholic religious sisters by Archbishop A. Franko, the Apostolic Nuncio, in the name of the Holy Father.

2)      In 1996, unlawful installation of L. Husar and his system which, in essence, destroys our Church.

3)      A process of liquidation of our whole Church started in Balamand.

4)      Liquidation of Bishop I. Bilyk OSBM (2007).

In the Czech Republic (through the Congregation for Bishops):

5)      Liquidation of Bishop P. Posád in 2008.

Your Eminence, certainly You can understand that in such a serious matter, which has an impact not only on our UGCC but also on the whole Church, we must uncompromisingly demand a private audience with the Holy Father.

You understand that we cannot react to any decrees from the papal dicasteries, even if they were signed by the Holy Father.

We humbly ask You to transmit this standpoint of ours to the Holy Father and to arrange for us the date of this private audience.

In Christ,

the bishops of UGCC

+ Samuel R. Oberhauser

+ Markian V. Hitiuk OSBM

+ Metod?j R. Špi?ík OSBM

+ Eliáš A. Dohnal OSBM

                                                                                                                                          Pidhirtsi, 1st April 2008

Address: Monastery OSBM, Pidhirtsi 80660, Brody district, Lvov region, Ukraine

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