The Greek-Catholic denomination is different from the Orthodox one by the
fact that the former recognizes the Pope as the supreme head of the Church.
Unlike the Orthodox the former practices the Eucharist with leavened and
unleavened bread; the Holy Spirit comes not only from the Father but also from
the Son. Like for the Roman-Catholic Church purgatory is the place for
purification. Its structure is similar and it follows the same discipline and
dogmas. The hierarchy is established by Papal rules. High offices are nominated
through Papal decrees. Masses, fasts and holidays are similar to those of the
Orthodox Church. There are different names for the Greek-Catholic Church, such
as the Catholic Church of Byzantine Rite, and the Church United with Rome. Among
the elements of controversy the subordination to the Pope has always been the
most provocative.
Studies and articles that deal with the relationship between the Orthodox
and the Greek-Catholic Church in Romania are dominated by religious and
sometimes even political partisanship. Many of the articles and studies are
signed by the representatives of the clergy. Historians, for whom one or the
other of the Churches has become an important issue, have also written. Most
highlight the documentary information (excerpts from the diocesan archives, from
the old books, from the press of the time). This is important for the knowledge
of the past, but these studies and articles often do not achieve the level of an
objective analysis. Both Church hierarchies have encouraged propaganda
literature or apologetics which do not correspond to the objectives of an
academic study. Some works serve as first hand bibliographic references for
historians: D.Prodan’s book: Supplex
Libellus Valchorum. Geneza naţiunii
române moderne [Supplex Libellus
Valchorum. The Genesis of the Modern Romanian Nation] and Francisc Pall’s
monograph entitled Inochentie Micu-Klein. They deal with the situation of the two
Churches during the 18th century, mostly with that of the
Greek-Catholic one, and highlight the national dimension of the religious
phenomenon.
Little is known from the perspective of the history of cultural and
political ideas; the convergences and divergences between these two cults have
to be studied with detachment. What I have in mind is a comparative presentation
of the evolution of the two faiths during the postwar period, mostly in the
years of the communist dictatorship and during the first post-communist decade.
The strict suppression of the Greek-Catholic Church drew my attention to some
historical aspects insufficiently or not at all known till now. I wanted to
insist upon some facts and data that show why, under the Soviet totalitarian
regime, the survival of the Greek-Catholic community was impossible. Last but
not least I tried to show which were and still are the aspirations of the
Greek-Catholics, and the reasons for perdurance of dogmatic differences with the
Orthodox. I tried to find out why the conflict between these two Churches
continued even in the recent decade and why they did not come to terms. The
history of the religious life is strongly linked to the history of ideas and
political events of the Romanian nation. The groups that governed during the Old
Kingdom and the inter-war periods of
Romania was always influenced by the
idea of religious adherence. By virtue of the traditional dependence between the
two spheres of activity, the Orthodox Church was so involved in policy making
that its representatives wanted higher state ranks. That was the case of the
Patriarch Miron Cristea, who became a member of the executive for several months
during the regal dictatorship of Carol II of Romania.
While, in the inter-war period the Orthodox Church took advantage of the
material and moral support of the nation state, the Greek-Catholic Church
survived through its own efforts. In the years immediately after Transylvania's
integration into the Romanian state, the Greek-Catholics
were subjected to discriminatory practices from the spiritual leaders of the
Orthodox Church, from the media and from some politicians1. The
Transylvanian Orthodox bishops, as well as the patriarchs of Bucharest,
repeatedly minimized the role of the Greek-Catholics in the process of Romanian
emancipation. The first denigrated the latter’s dogmas and granted them only
minor positions in the organizational problems of the religious and cultural
life of the majority.
Among the anti-Greek-Catholic forms of propaganda which echoed in
interwar society, some was initiated by the Orthodox Bishop of Transylvania,
Nicolae Bălan. His cooperation with the representatives of the
extreme-right, the Iron Guard, and with the fascist general, Ion Antonescu,
indicate both a continuation of interdependence between state and the Orthodox
Church, and lack of a culture based on the idea of a possible opposition against
the dictatorial political system. In the years of the extreme-right
dictatorship, the Orthodox Church supported the regime. Some of its leaders
offered their assistance in the service of the ideology and the political action
of Ion Antonescu2. During this period, the Greek-Catholics preserved
their dignity, refusing to collaborate with the political power. Their ideology
was an ethnically oriented, but state politics was differently perceived. In
opposition to the Orthodox priests who, in their majority, joined the fascist
movement known as the Iron Guard, the Greek-Catholic priests, in the majority
served the Church. As the situation of Transylvania was different from the rest
of Romania as far as the linguistic communities, the regional culture and the
mentalities were concerned, the Greek-Catholic leaders adopted a position
specific to the area, which allowed them to assert their proper identity.
The contribution of Greek-Catholic bishoprics of Transylvania to the
organization of the anti-fascist resistance was highlighted in a documentary
study written by Gh. Zaharie and L.Vajda3. During the war, the bishop
of Cluj, Dr. Iuliu Hossu, was one of the prelates who constantly militated in
favor of the Romanian-Hungarian dialogue and understanding. He stated:
"We will accomplish our mission on Transylvanian soil [...] where our
ancestors sleep their eternal sleep so that their sleep would be a source of
blessed peace and a bridge of reconciliation between the two nations, who are
doomed together in the middle of this world cataclysm."
This was his address4 to regent
Horthy of Hungary when he visited Cluj on September 15th, 1940. There
were instances when the bishop tried to mediate between the dictatorial
governments of Budapest and Bucharest. Dr. Hossu intervened in helping the
Jewish population of Cluj with food while it was concentrated in ghettos, and
protected their refuge in Romania during their deportation to the concentration
camps of Auschwitz5.
The end of World War II and the setting up of the communist regime under
the pressure of the Soviet army was the first tragic moment in the history of
the two Romanian Churches. The unification of the two institutions was possible
only by denouncing the Concordat with
Vatican on July 17th, 1948 and by elaborating the new law of cults on
August 4th, 19486. Both acts were formulated by the
authority of the Orthodox Church and of the communist regime. Greek-Catholics
hold that had the Orthodox Church not collaborated with the communist regime,
their cult would not have been abolished. The survival of the Roman-Catholic
Church of Romania and the resumption of its relation with Vatican a few years
after communism give witness to this.
In 1948 the state and the new Orthodox hierarchy organized important
activities in view of unification of the Greek-Catholic Church with the
Orthodox. The anniversary of one hundred years since the 1848 Revolution was a
proper opportunity for the latter to defame the merits of the Greek-Catholics.
Nicolae Bălan, who by a subtle personal policy and by cooperating with the
communist regime, had succeeded in keeping his position of Bishop of
Trannsylvania, was one of the most active propagandists7. He was the
most appropriate person to attack Romanian religious pluralism, as the
communists knew about his pro-Iron Guard and pro-Antonescu activities. He was a
person suited for the new political regime imposed by Moscow. This explained the
fact that Nicolae Bălan was the one who addressed the keynote speech in
Blaj on May 15, 1948.
In the presence of the members of the government and those of the
Communist Party, he called for the unification of the Churches asserting:
"The
Habsburgs cut into two our nation in Transylvania to weaken us and to more
easily rule. Today they no longer have power over us, and, therefore, cannot
hinder us in reuniting. Today, when the People's Republic of Romania guarantees
equal political, economic, cultural and religious rights, keeping up the
spiritual gap caused by the severe situation around 1700 for the Transylvanian
Romanian people, means abandoning the mission of our working class at the dawn
of the future. As a descendent of the ancient bishops of Bălgrade (Alba-Iulia)
who had under their protection the whole Romanian life in Transylvania, I am
addressing you whom the foreign interest had driven away from our good mother,
the Orthodox Church, a warm fatherly call to come back home”8.
The bishop adapted his previous hostility towards the religious diversity
of the Transylvanian Romanians to the new political situation. In 1936 -- on the
occasion of a Congress of the Romanian Orthodox Fraternity -- Nicolae Bălan
spoke in the same terms about the need to abolish the Greek-Catholic Church. He
saw in the Catholic denomination a real threat for the future of the
"Romanian people". According to this way of thinking, coping with the
ideology of both the extreme right and extreme left wing, the idea of unity
between the two religions was dictated by "our racial instinct itself”9.
This tendency to cooperate with any type of regime in order to keep power is not
unique in Romania’s public life as the fascist and communist totalitarian
regimes did the same. The ideological content of Bălan's discourse was
taken over by Iustinian Marina, the new Patriarch of the Orthodox Church voted
by the Romanian Parliament. On May 24th, 1948 he declared:
“If the first Patriarch of the country,
Miron (Cristea, our note), legislated the political and national unification of
Romania, the duty of the third Patriarch will be to unify the Churches under one
hierarchy"10.
Iustinian Marina, who was in charge of the abolition of the
Greek-Catholic Church, spoke about the "painful" split of the two
Romanian religious institutions "that lasted for 250 years". In his
address of June 6th, 1948 at St. Spiridon Church on the occasion of
his appointment as Patriarch, he asked the Greek-Catholics to rejoin Orthodoxy.
He vaguely evoked history, mingling it with the national militantism of the
previous centuries, and political motifs of the moment. According to him, the
Greek-Catholic Church was reminiscent of the Habsburg Empire, an outcome of the
"intrigues" of the Viennese House and a hope for the Pope's propaganda
in Romania. Therefore, the Romanian Orthodox Patriarch considered that the
return of all Romanians to one single Church must be equivalent with their
liberation from a humiliating "tyranny". Iustinian Marina asked
rhetorically:
“What
does separate us? Nothing else but your obedience to Rome. Return to your faith,
to the Church of your people, of your and our ancestors. All our energy that we
have used up to now for the defensive battle to save our religious and national
being must be put, from now on, in the service of our Romanian state, the
People's Republic of Romania, in order to consolidate the independence and
sovereignty of our democratic state”11.
The discourse of the high representative of
the Orthodox Church highlighted the obsession of the uniqueness of the Orthodox
faith, the overlapping of the national ideas with those of religious faith, and
also the recognition of the new state form, imposed by the communists. It was a
belief that coincided with Moscow's intentions and also with the
ethno-nationalist trend of a part of the Romanian intelligentsia.
Practically, the year of 1948 meant the abolishing of the Greek-Catholic
Church and passing into illegality of all its activities. Once the signal was
given, the Greek-Catholic priests willing to compromise were recruited. They
could not resist the pressures and threats against them and their families. A
meeting in the gym of the "George Bariţiu" high school in Cluj on
October 1st, 1948 of thirty-six representatives of the Greek-Catholic
Church established the delegation that would go to Bucharest for the great
reunion. The Synod Act of October 3rd, signed by the participants,
meant practically the legalization of the unification of the two cults and thus
the status of illegality for the Transylvanian Church. One of the priests
testified about the event:
“We were taken from home to Cluj by the
militia. The police guarded the Congress Hall. The debates were short. As the
designation of the chairman (Archpriest Traian Belaşcu ) was according to
orders, he did not know what he was to say. At that moment Priest Zagrai handed
him a text and he read it with a trembling voice. Discussions began. The
<<witnesses>> in the hall interrupted them. Everyone had to sign
[...] From that moment we were taken to the residence of the Orthodox Bishop,
Colan, and from there to the railway station. On the road we were given first
meal of that day. At Athené Palace we
were under surveillance. That day (October 3rd) we were free after
having signed all papers and after having attended a Te Deum at the St. Spiridon
Church. We were treated with such violence that one of us lost his mind. I do
not know why we signed; I think we were drugged”12.
The real abolishment of the Greek-Catholicism took place on December 1st,
1948, by the decree of the “high presidium of the People's Republic of
Romania, No. 358”13. First rank personalities of the Greek-Catholic
world did not sign the documents for joining Orthodoxy, although among the
signers there were many of the archpriests with authority. The most important
prelates behaved in accordance with the dogmas of their denomination and proved
to have remarkably strong characters. Archpriests Iuliu Hossu and Ioan Suciu
were among the most active opponents and did not recognize the act of
unification. Iuliu Hossu was excommunicated by a decree of the chairman of the
"congress" framed in Cluj on October 1st, 1948. In a letter
addressed to all dioceses under his jurisdiction he asked that both his position
as defender and continuer of the Catholic denomination and the above-mentioned
excommunication decree be brought to the attention of all Greek-Catholics.
The Apostolic Nuncio of Bucharest, and archbishop Gerard Patrick O'Hara
of Savannah also came to the defense and
in a letter addressed to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on October 2nd,
1948, he spoke about the outrageous attitude of the Romanian government that did
not respect religious liberty. In spite of its declarations the civil power
committed itself to religious persecutions. Its initial commitments were
violated by facts "carefully prepared and very subtly coordinated, in
various parts of Transylvania against the Greek-Catholic Church". Gerald
O'Hara said that this attitude was unworthy for a civilized state14.
The protests of the Greek-Catholic and those of the Roman-Catholic bishops
addressed to the Petru Groza government had no effect. All rural communities in
Tîrgu-Lăpuş, Boiereni, Vadu-Crişului, Sopteriu-Mureş
protested against the act of October 3rd. The peasants were defeated;
they were abused, imprisoned for many years and their goods were confiscated.
The Greek-Catholic Church was dispossessed of its goods. They were partly taken
by the state and partly by the Orthodox Church15. At the time when
Greek-Catholic Church was outlawed it had got an organizational structure called
“The Metropolitan Province of Alba Iulia and Făgăraş”, with
the seat in Blaj. It included the Archdiocese of Blaj, coordinated by Bishop Dr.
Ioan Suciu, apostolic administrator; the Diocese of Cluj-Gherla headed by Bishop
Iuliu Hossu; the Diocese of Oradea-Mare lead by Bishop Dr. Valeriu Traian Frenţiu;
the Diocese of Lugoj, lead by bishop Dr. Ioan Nălan; the Diocese of
Maramureş lead by Bishop Dr. Alexandru Rusu; and the metropolitan office of
locum tenens in Bucharest headed by
Dr. Vasile Aftenie. The Metropolitan Province had got around 2 million members,
1900 parishes, 1900 churches and 1835 priests. In the same Province there were 9
monastic orders with 28 houses, 424 monks and nuns, 20 high schools for boys
with a total of 3352 pupils, 14 high schools for girls with a total of 2800
pupils, 4 orphanages and asylums for senior people, and 6 publishing houses that
printed 20 weekly and monthly revues in approximately 250,000 copies16.
The above-mentioned data show that the Greek-Catholic Church was a
complex institution, well organized, and including an important part of
Transylvania's Romanian population. As one can see from the enumeration of the
dioceses, except the Bucharest office of locum
tenens, all the others were situated in Transylvania. Statistics of the
interwar period show that the percentage of Greek-Catholics against the Orthodox
was 64.3 percent in Maramureş County, 42.7 percent in Cluj County and its
suburbs, 60 percent in the Satu-Mare County, 60 percent in Năsăud
County and the neighboring zones, 52.5 percent in Sălaj County, 32.4
percent in Mureş County 17.
The reasons for abolishing the Greek-Catholic Church were political. To
grasp the political significance of the anti-Greek-Catholic attitude, it must be
noted that the pro-western orientation of the Church played an important role in
the process of education of the Romanian population of Transylvania, namely, in
its adoption and maintenance of high living standards in comparison with the
Orthodox population. The same Church stimulated the intellectual aspirations of
its parishioners and educated them in the western European work ethic. This also
explains why coexistence of the Greek-Catholic Romanian population with the
Magyar and German minorities was more likely in zones with multi-linguistic
population. The idea of belonging to the same Catholic Church had often been a
bridge linking various ethnic groups that lived together for centuries.
An analysis of the facts reveals that either the tendency to simplify the
explanation or the effort to reduce it to conflicting ideologies does not convey
a real understanding of the phenomenon. Rather, that must be based on the
geographic history and on the history of cultural and political thinking.
According to these, in the case of Romania, the difficulty of cooperation
between the two cults did not lie in the lack of a single religious discourse,
as the leaders of Orthodoxy tried to demonstrate and the communists wanted to
believe, but in the contradictory religious and cultural orientations: one
Eastern Slavic-Byzantine and the other Western Roman-Catholic, and the
confrontation between the two sets of values -- Oriental or Balkan and European. Probably thus we can better
understand why the Greek-Catholic Church had become one of the most detested
opponents of the Soviet-communist regime and why, on the other hand, the
Romanian Orthodox Church immediately accepted the new regime and had cooperated
with it.
The systematic persecution of the Greek-Catholics began in 1948 and
lasted for a long time. The Bishops Valeriu Traian Frenţiu, Alexandru Rusu,
Ioan Bălan, Iuliu Hossu, Ioan Suciu, and Anton Durcovici, as well as the
priests Ludovic Vida, Gheorghe Bob, Ioan Moldovan, Augustin Felea and Tit Liviu
Chinezu, were all imprisoned. The same was the case with the papal prelates
Zenovie Pâclişanu and Augustin Maghiaru, and the Bishop of Timişoara,
Augustin Pacha18.
Bishop Vasile Aftenie was murdered on May 10th, 1950 by the
communist authorities and today is considered one of the martyrs of the Romanian
Greek-Catholic Church19. Many ordinary priests who refused to convert
to Orthodoxy were sentenced to prison, treated as political prisoners. They were
subjected to forced labor in the construction of the Danube-Black Sea Canal and
the Bicaz hydro-power station. They were tortured, and isolated in barren
villages of the Bărăgan steppe (situated in southern Romania) which
were without any modern means of transportation. Their properties were
confiscated and their family members were fired from their jobs. The majority of
the Greek-Catholic priests’ children were expelled from high schools and
universities or not allowed to attend universities. Their evacuation from the
parish houses was done by force, menacing them with prison. Whenever they
opposed the priests and parishes faced trial by court-martial. This was the case
of nineteen people sentenced in Tîrgu-Mureş on April 18th, 195220,
of some important representatives of the clergy of Maramureş21,
and of Archbishop Dr. Ioan Deliman.
Despite persecutions, the activity of the Greek-Catholic Church could not
be stopped. The free priests organized masses at their homes, namely Ioan
Ploscaru in Lugoj, Nicolae Purea in Cluj and Alexandru Todea in Reghin.
Therefore, they became the targets of a new wave of imprisonment. Even under
special circumstances like this, the parishioners did everything to preserve
their convictions. The nuns of the “Mother of God” Congregation and the
priests Nicolae Purea, Augustin Silvestru Prunduş and Ioan Bejan in Cluj
carried out important duties in this sense. The cooperation of the Piarist
Church of Cluj was exemplary.
Literary clubs and societies of Romanian writers of Transylvania
cultivated Greek Catholic values as much as they could. The translation into
Romanian of religious meditation works by priest Gheorghe Neamţiu was of
great importance. An important role in maintaining the Catholic denomination
among the Romanians was played by the "Vatican" and "Radio Free
Europe", which regularly broadcast masses by priests Vasile Cristea, Ovidiu
Bejan and Alexandru Mircea.
In the years of the communist regime, the resistance movements were
carried on in centers with previous Greek-Catholic tradition, such as Reghin,
Cluj, Lugoj, Baia-Mare and sometimes even in Bucharest. Relations between the
two Churches were tense during the communist dictatorship. The Orthodox Church
manifested itself indifferent to the crisis situation of the Greek-Catholic
Church. It also took a hostile attitude, publishing defamatory articles in its
revues, namely in Telegraful Român of
Sibiu, the Biserica Ortodoxă Română
review in Bucharest, and in other metropolitan publications of the Orthodox
cult. The Romanian totalitarian communist state controlled not only the cultural
and political opinions, but also the religious life of the population22.
This attitude satisfied the nationalist pride of some of the representatives of
the Orthodox Church, who saw in Greek-Catholicism a danger to ethnic and
national unity. This could explain why the state often manipulated cults
according to its ideological orientations.
Orthodoxy, as an official institution cooperated closely with the regime,
accepting that the Ministry of Cults, set-up by the government dictate its
ideological orientation, select its personal, and run its international and
domestic relations. While the Orthodox Church was free to develop its activity,
the Greek-Catholic Church was interdicted, as it could be the main opposition to
the communist totalitarian state. Without trying to compare the sufferings,
physical and moral, and the material deprivation, even the Orthodox world was
under surveillance by the regime from 1948 to 1989. There were situations when
Orthodox priests from Transylvania and Banat manifested understanding for the
Greek-Catholic traditions, unofficially admitting their continuation. Thus
happened, for instance, in Lugoj and Timişoara where the rites of both
Churches were respected on the occasion of many Christian holidays. After the
collapse of Ceauşescu’s regime in December 1989, the Greek-Catholic
Church tried to regain possession of its assets. By the decree law no. 8 of
December 30, 1989 issued by the provisional government (installed after Ceauşescu's
removal) the decree of October 1, 1948, which forbade the activity of
Greek-Catholics, was annulled. All goods belonging to the Greek-Catholic Church
were returned, by decree-law no. 126 of April 9th, 1990, namely
churches, schools, residences, hospitals, orphanages, and so on. The most
important problem was and still is, however, the retrocession of churches. The
only region where some of them were given back without problems is Banat. This
was due to the tolerant attitude of the local population and to the decisive
contribution of the Orthodox Archbishop of Timişoara, Dr. Nicolae Corneanu.
Thus the Lugoj Church became one of the most important diocesan Greek-Catholic
churches.
The situation was different in Cluj, Maramureş, Sălaj and
Bistriţa Năsăud counties, where the conflicts between the two
institutions degenerated repeatedly23. The mixed committees that
periodically gathered did not always reach a common viewpoint in order to solve
the problem. The final sentences were in favor of the Greek-Catholics in most
cases, but these were not observed. In some other circumstances, the
retrocession was delayed without any reason. There are towns where even today
mass is held under the open sky. This happens because the Orthodox Church wants
the problem solved by the dioceses. The mixed committees came to the same
conclusion on December 1998 and January 1999. Usually, the representatives of
the government do not interfere, as they do not want to risk loosing their
popularity before the electorate.
The hierarchy of the Greek-Catholic Church was reestablished immediately
after the 1989 events. The bishops of the Greek-Catholic dioceses of Romania
were nominated by the decision of Pope John Paul II on March 13th,
1990. They were Alexandru Todea Archbishop of Alba-Iulia and Făgăraş,
who was replaced by Bishop Lucian Mureşan as he became severely ill; Ioan
Ploscaru, Bishop of the Lugoj Diocese; George Guţu Archbishop of the
Cluj-Turda Diocese; Vasile Hossu Bishop of the Oradea Diocese; Ioan Chertes
Archbishop of the Cluj Diocese. In March 1991, Alexandru Todea was elected
president of the Confederation of the Greek-Catholic Episcopate of Romania, and
in 1991 he became cardinal by a Papal decree. The congregation is not so large
today as during the interwar period, but it is constantly increasing. There are
areas (i.e. Maramureş County) where statistics indicate the existence of
140,000 faithful after the 1992 census. Their number increased during the last
years and, therefore, there was considerable friction for the churches in the
villages and towns of the above-mentioned region24. Also in Maramureş
County there are 240 parishes and 13 districts with Greek-Catholic archbishops.
All these data contradict the opinion according to which "the
Greek-Catholics have hierarchy and bishops, but do not have faithful and even
ask their retrogression"25.
The Greek-Catholics' discontents intensified as the solving of the
patrimonial problems was postponed sine
die. The disputes in Cluj in 1998 and the beginning of 1999 degenerated into
violent conflicts between the two congregations. In one of the churches lawfully
regained by the Greek-Catholics a conflict broke out between the parishioners.
This was due to the Orthodox Bishop of Cluj who, during the ’90s had
maintained a hostile atmosphere, relating his own activity to the xenophobe
National Unity Romanian Party and nationalist-extremist Mayor Gheorghe Funar. On
the part of the Greek-Catholics’ the lack of tact and diplomacy of the
journalists and of some of the people show the existence of certain resentment.
Without doubt political ideas contributed enormously to the conservation of the
above-mentioned spirit. In the ‘90s, Cluj was the place par excellence where both the religious disputes between the
Orthodox and Greek-Catholics and the ideological-administrative disputes between
the Romanians and the Magyars, took place. Is it about a collision of two
cultural options or are these remnants of Ceauşescu's
communist-nationalistic regime? What happened in Cluj at the decision-making
level suggested that modernization was involved. It could be that the modest
echo of the school and media affected the political milieu and especially the
masses. The poor education of many social segments makes them easily manipulable
by political leaders. The revival of the religious life of Greek-Catholics was
unexpected by Romanian and international public opinion. It demonstrated the
survival of different spiritual aspirations within the Romanian society, which
was quite surprising after half a century of communist oppression.
As for the clarification of doctrinaire issues, a real inter-confessional
debate did not take place. A part of the dissensions between the Churches were
taken up by the cultural press, but no fair way of solving the problem has yet
been found. Above the contractions between the cultural stereotypes there is a
social and political reality conferred by the Western orientation of the
Greek-Catholic Church for over three hundred years, namely its affiliation to
the modern European civilization mentioned in the first paragraphs of this
chapter. The fact and consequences of communist times is close to that of
religious groups belonging to nations of Central Europe and the role there of
schools, seminaries, priestly vocations and dogmatic rigor26. These
activities, as well as church dogma, constitute a bridge between Orthodoxy and
Catholicism.
As the challenges of the modern world were not subjected to a discussion,
Orthodox Church leaders were unable to make the necessary distinctions in order
to preserve the autonomy of the cult. Thus an explanation of the clashes of the
two Romanian cults in Transylvania could be that the Orthodox Church was not
reformed. Other causes might be centralism and disregard of the particular
regional problems. The two totalitarian regimes took advantage of the fact that
some of the champions of the Orthodox Romanian Church detested democracy, more
specifically the pluralistic forms of the social, religious and cultural
existence. The overlapping of concepts of “state”, “church” and
“nation” was possible because not only the representatives of the church and
politicians cultivated the intellectual ignorance, but also the lay
intelligentsia. This led to each cult demanding its right to speak in the name
of the nation, to advocate the expression "Church of the nation", and
claiming competence in problems that concern exclusively the state and the civic
power. In this respect, it should be noted that the revival of Greek-Catholicism
in Transylvania after 1989 coincided with the 19th century type
discourse, which is full of resentments.
The first visit of the Pope in Romania, a majority Orthodox country, was
due to the existence of Greek-Catholics, to their sufferings during the
communist regime and to the need to sustain them in their attempt to regain the
position they lost in the religious and cultural life of Transylvania. The
meeting between the Pope John Paul II and the Patriarch Teoctist was admired by
the Romanian Orthodox clergy. The trans-confessional message of the Pope was
resumed by the words "all people should be my family - and all Christians
be one". The two cults were invited to meditate and the following political
step of the Romanian majority was to depend to a great extent on the content of
the inter-confessional dialogue27.
The visit of Pope John Paul II in Romania in May 1999 revealed that both
cults were prepared for dialogue. In his speech the Pope evoked the idea of
mutual understanding between the two Romanian cults. He highlighted the merits
of the Greek-Catholics during the anti-communist resistance period, and
suggested that one Church should not evoke the past to the detriment of the
other. The Papal message gained the admiration of the Romanian public
irrespective of confession and did away with the false image cultivated by the
anti-Catholic folklore.
The Romanian Orthodox Church accepted the Pope's visit, and through the
voice of the Patriarch supported ecumenism and cooperation with the democratic
forces in Romania. On that occasion, the Romanian Orthodox Church had to face
the problem of secularization, closely linked to the functioning of one of the
basic principles of modern world. The Church proved itself open to dialogue and
to facing the problem of revising the anti-modern orientation that had estranged
it from the traditional values of Western Europe.
1.
The Greek-Catholic Church is the result of the unification of a part of
the Romanian Orthodox faithful in Transylvania with the Church of Rome. That is,
a number of Orthodox accepted to convert to Catholicsm under the leadership of
their bishops, keeping some specific elements to the Orthodox denomination. This
phenomenon happened between 1697-1701. The suggestion came from Emperor Leopold
I of the Habsburg Empire who initiated the whole action by the Act of 1692. The
meaning of unification was both religious and political. The unification should
have led to the Catholic assimilation of the entire Romanian population of
Transylvania; its conditions were transformed into political claims by the
representatives of the Greek-Catholic clergy. They asked for an end to mere
toleration, the right to have positions in the administration of Transylvania
and of the Empire, and the right to have Romanian schools and to use the
Romanian language. The Greek-Catholic Church made the first important step
toward forming the collective identity awareness of the Romanian population in
Transylvania. The goal of assimilation in the founding of the Church stimulated
the forming of an intellectual elite and the emancipation of part of the
population. The unification with the Church of Rome opened the way to literacy
and development of a generation of scholars known as Şcoala
ardeleană [The Transylvanian School]. The unification also contributed to a
better understanding of the concept of the Austrian Aufklärung idea and of the “nation”.
2.
This was the case of Nicolae Bălan who accepted the position of
Metropolitan Bishop over the territories occupied by the Romanian army during
its campaign side by side with the Nazis against the Soviet Union. On the other
hand, the same Bishop advocated before Antonescu, stopping the deportation of
the Transylvanian and Banat Jews to the extermination camp of Lublin. See
Alexandru Şafran: Un tison arraché
aux flammes. Mémoires, (Bucureşti: Hasefer, 1995). In a chapter of my
book, The History of the Jews of Banat
Region, to be published at Tel-Aviv University, I have mentioned the role
played by baron Franz von Neumann in preventing the deportation of the Jews from
Timişoara, Arad and Turda. See also Victor Neumann; Istoria evreilor din România. Studii documentare şi teoretice
[The History of the Jews of Romania. Documentary
and Theoretical Studies], (Timişoara: Amarcord, 1996).
3.
Vaida L. Zaharie, Rezistenţa
antifascistă în partea de nord a Transilvaniei [Anti-Fascist Resistance in
Northern Transylvania], (Cluj, 1974).
4.
See Şematismul Episcopiei
greco-catolice de Cluj-Gherla [The Calendar
of the Greek-Catholic Bishopric
of Cluj-Gherla] for 1947 p. 65, according to Silvestru Aug. Prunduş,
Clemente Plăianu, Alexandru Nicula, Ion M. Bota, Ion Costan, Cardinal
Iuliu Hossu [Cardinal Iuliu Hossu], (Cluj: Unitas, 1995), p. 117.
5.
Silvestru Aug. Prunduş; Clemente Plăianu; Alexandru Nicula;
Ion M. Bota; Ion Costan, Cardinalul Iuliu
Hossu [Cardinal Iuliu Hossu], (Cluj: Unitas, 1995).
6.
Alexandru Raţiu, Persecuţia
Bisericii Române Unite, [The Persecution of the Romanian United Church],
(Oradea: Imprimeria de Vest, 1994).
7.
The Chief Rabbi of Romania, Alexandru Şafran, intervened in his
favor. See Alexandru Şafran , op. cit.
8.
Al. Rădulescu; C. Sădeanu, Reîntregirea
Bisericii Românesti din Ardeal [Re-unification of the Romanian Church in
Transylvania], (Bucharest, 1948). See also Alexandru Mircea; Pamfil Cârnaţiu;
Mircea Todericiu, “Calvarul Bisericii Unite” ["The Ordeal of the United
Church"] in the volume: Biserica Română
Unită. Două sute de ani de istorie, [The United Romanian Church.
Two Hundred Years of History], (Cluj: Viaţa Creştină Publishing
House, 1998).
9.
Unirea, Greek-Catholic newspaper, Blaj, issue of November 7, 1936.
10.
According to the Drapelul nostru
[ Our Flag] newspaper, Baia-Mare, no. 29/1948 p. 2.
11.
Al. Rădulescu; C. Sadeanu, Op.cit.
12.
According to Alexandru Mircea, Pamfil Cârnaţiu, op.cit., p. 253.
13.
Ioan Bota, Istoria Bisericii
Universale, [History of the Universal
Church], (Cluj: Viaţa Creştină, 1994).
14.
See the documents published in the volume: The United Romanian Church. Two Hundred Fifty Years of History, pp.
257-258.
15.
Ioan Ploscaru, Scurtă istorie
a bisericii române [Short History of the Romanian Church], (Timişoara:
Signata Publishing House, 1994).
16.
Ibidem.
17.
Romanian Statistical Yearbook, 1930.
18.
Valeriu Achim: The Sighet Prison
Accuses, (Baia Mare, 1991), p. 59.
19.
Ioan Bota, Istoria Bisericii
Universale, [History of the Universal
Church], (Cluj: Viaţa Creştină, 1994).
20.
Ibidem.
21.
According to the Graiul Maramureşului
[The Voice of Maramureş] newspaper, year IX, no. 64/1998, p. 2.
22.
Except for the Orthodox all the other cults were under surveillance by
the authorities. No other denomination was so oppressed as the Greek Orthodox
one; no other was outlawed but the Greek-Catholic faith. Even the neo-Protestant
cults were considered less “dangerous” than the Greek-Catholic one and in
some cases the formers were even allowed to keep international relations and to
get material help from overseas.
23.
See, for example, the articles in Graiul
Maramureşului newspaper, Baia Mare, year X, no. 42/1999.
24.
Romanian Statistical Yearbook, 1992.
25.
Teodor Damşa, The
Greek-Catholic Church in Historical Perspective, (Timişoara: West,
1994), p. 246.
26.
Dialogue with Vicar George Surdu, head of the Romanian Greek-Catholic
Mission in Paris, July 19, 1999.
27.
On June 10, 1999 a new meeting of the joint Orthodox and Greek-Catholic
Committee was held; it analyzed Pope John Paul II’s visit to Romania.
According to Vestitorul Unirii (review
of the Greek-Catholic Bishopric), Oradea, year VIII., No. 1, 1999, p. 2.
ACHIM, Valeriu -- Închisoarea din
Sighet acuză, [The Sighet Prison Accuses], (Baia-Mare: Gutinul, 1991).
BOTA, Ioan, -- Istoria Bisericii
Universale, [History of the Universal Church], (Cluj: Viaţa Creştină,
1994).
CARMILLY-WEINBERGER, Moshe -- Istoria
evreilor din Transilvania [History of Jews
of Transylvania], (Bucharest: Enciclopedică Publishing House, 1994).
MIRCEA, Alexandru; CARNAŢIU, Pamfil; TODERICIU Mircea –
“Calvarul Bisericii Unite” [“The Ordeal of the United Church”] in the
volume: Biserica Română Unită.
Două sute de ani de istorie, [The United Roman Church. Two Hundred
Years of History], (Cluj: Viaţa Creştină Publishing House, 1998).
NEUMANN, Victor -- Istoria
evreilor din România. Studii documentare şi teoretice [History of the
Jews of Romania. Documentary Studies and Theoretical Survey], (Timişoara:
Amarcord, 1996).
IDEM, -- The History of the Jews
of Banat, to be published by (Tel-Aviv University Press, 2002).
PLOSCARU, Ioan -- Scurtă
istorie a bisericii române [Short History of the Romanian Church], (Timişoara:
Signata Publishing House, 1994).
PRUNDUŞ, Silvestru Aug.; PLĂIANU, Clemente; NICULA, Alexandru;
BOTA, Ion M.; COSTAN Ion -- Cardinalul
Iuliu Hossu [Cardinal Iuliu
Hossu], (Unitas: Cluj, 1995).
RĂDULESCU, Al.; SĂDEANU C. -- Reîntregirea
Bisericii Româneşti din Ardeal [Re-unification of the Romanian Church in
Transylvania], (Bucureşti, 1948).
RAŢIU, Alexandru -- Persecuţia
Bisericii Române Unite, [The Persecution of the Romanian United Church],
(Oradea: Imprimeria de Vest Publishing House, 1994).
ŞAFRAN, Alexandru -- Un tison
arraché aux flammes.Mémoires, Editions Stock, (Paris, 1989).
ZAHARIE G.,VAIDA L., -- Rezistenţa
antifascistă în partea de nord a Transilvaniei [Anti-Fascist Resistance in
Northern Transylvania], (Cluj, 1974).
Unirea Greek Catholic
newspaper, Blaj, issue of November 7, 1936. .