Between 1946 and 1989, the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church was the largest banned religious community in the world and endured hard experiences. ``The church of martyrs'' _ so the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church was named by its Head Metropolitan Iosyf Slipyi in his lecture devoted to the 35th anniversary of its persecution. Before World War II, on the Ukrainian lands entered into the Polish state, the Greek Catholic Church consisted of the Lviv archeparchy, Stanislaviv and Peremysl eparchies, Apostolic Administrature for Lemkiwshchyna and Apostolic Visitature for Volyn, Cholmshchyna, and Pidlyashshya; it had a Metropolitan, six bishops, and one Apostolic Administrator. The Church listed 2387 parishes and 3,6 millions faithful, which were served by 2352 parish priests and 143 priests of various orders, 31 male and 121 female monasteries and monastic houses with 315 monks and 932 nuns. Under guardianship of the Church there were acted Theological Academy, three ecclesiastical seminaries with 480 students, as well as a ramified network of the catholic schools, publishing houses, and religious organizations. The first and second arrivals of the Soviet power in 1939 and 1944, with its atheism as a part of communist ideology, resulted in deprivation of all the material resources of the Church (closing the religious institutions and organizations, nationalization of the property) with a gradual elimination of the UGCC from the public life. However, a final goal of the Moscow leaders was the official liquidation of the UGCC by means of the joining up the priests and parishes with the Russian Orthodox Church. After the death of Metropolitan Andrej Sheptytsky (1.11.1944) and imprisonment of the bishops in Lviv and Stanislaviv (11.04.1945) on March 8-10, 1946, a rump synod in Lviv proclaimed the amalgamation of the UGCC into the Russian Orthodox Church. In 1949 it was proclaimed the transition of the Zakarpatian greek-catholics to the Orthodox Church. Although a part of the Peremyshl eparchia was outside the Soviet Ukraine, it still retained under the influence of the USSR. Therefore, the UGCC in Poland was also liquidated by means of the similar methods (25-26.06.1946 _ arrest and deportation to the Soviet Union of the Bishops of Peremyshl). These acts put outlaw of the Greek Catholic Church at the external (official) level. A next step of the official power was the liquidation of monasteries. It was performed in the systematic and gradual way during 1946-1949. As last there were closed Basilian male monastery in Hoshiv (1950) and nunneries of the Studite sisters in Yachtoriv (1949) and Basilian sisters in Suchowolya (1952).

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The Structure of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church

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Stalinist Repression. Religious along with believers sent into exile