Religion, trade and trust in South‐East Poland

Abstract

The village of Krasiczyn is located on the River San about ten kilometres west of Przemysl, once a Habsburg garrison in the centre of Galicia but since 1945 a medium-sized Polish frontier city: the Ukrainian border is a mere 10 kilometres to the east. Krasiczyn is dominated by its Renaissance castle, in the extensive grounds of which a tastefully modernised outbuilding now serves as a hotel and conference centre. This was the venue for an academic conference in October 1996 on the subject of 'Church Unions in Central and Eastern Europe: Ideals and Realities'.1 The scholars attending came from many European countries and from Canada and the United States. They included priests of different denominations and their expertise covered many disciplines, notably history, sociology, theology, anthropology and political science. This diverse gathering maintained a very cordial atmosphere, the climax of which was a festive supper on the last evening of the conference, at which the local Roman Catholic priest was an invited guest. Though not primarily a scholar, this priest was interested in the themes of the conference and well known in the public sphere in Przemysl for his efforts to improve mutual understanding between Poles and Ukrainians. He agreed with a visiting Greek Catholic priest (born in this area but for 40 years resident in Rome) that they should mark this unusual conference by celebrating mass together on the following morning, a Sunday. The local priest joked that together they would improvise a new, hybrid form of service, a fusion of the Latin (Roman) and Greek (Byzantine) rites. The rest of us turned up eagerly in the church the following morning. Everything about the building and its decoration epitomised Polish Latin styles. The service stuck closely to the modern Latin rite, although the visiting priest preached most of his sermon in Ukrainian. Both he and his Roman Catholic cocelebrant emphasised the need for Poles and Ukrainians to understand each other better. Not only were they one before God but, pointed out the local priest in his welcoming remarks, following the demise of socialism the two countries were increasingly dependent on each other economically. Without the new opportunities for cross-border commerce many families in and around Przemysl would face unemployment and severe hardship. All this, said the priest, needed to be placed in historical context, and the Church Unions which were the theme of our conference deserved to be seen as pioneering efforts to promote understanding and rapprochement. In 1996 Catholics were celebrating the 350th anniversary of the Union of Mukachevo and the 400th anniversary of the Union of Brest, which had brought many millions of Orthodox Christians into communion with Rome. As a few old men coughed and children