ETHNICITY AND RELIGION – UKRAINIAN ORTHODOX CHURCH AFTER OPERATION „WISŁA”

Abstract

There are three traditional foundation or pillars of Ukrainian national identity; language, religion and social memory but religion is the most important. It is connected in special way with the Orthodox Church and its role to the preservation and reconstruction that identity. Interviews conducted among Orthodox Church priests working in the decanates of Olsztyn, Elbląg and Węgorzewo and other researches make clear that religion is the real value of native ethnic culture and center of Ukrainian national consciousness. Social and cultural role of Orthodox parish churches in the Ukrainian community refers also to the situation before 1947 i.e. deportation Ukrainians on Wamia and Mazury. History and memory of the polish-ukrainian borderland show that among principles of coexistence of Poles and Ukrainians religion and church were the most important. Now significance of religion in processes of identification is also recognized. It seems that future existence of Ukrainian diaspora in Warmia and Mazury depends on religion. It means that the range of the assimilation processes will depend not only on rate of conversional and mixed marriage but also on different forms of secularization. Religious institutions are connected with political; Ukrainian Orthodox Church which gained full political and cultural rights after 1989 increased his social and cultural activity to become the most important institution of presentation of ethnic group interests.