OBITUARY: The Rev. Petro B.T. Bilaniuk, 66, prominent Catholic theologian (10/04/98)

OBITUARY

The Rev. Petro B.T. Bilaniuk, 66, prominent Catholic theologian

by Andrij Kudla Wynnyckyj
Toronto Press Bureau

TORONTO - The Rev. Petro Borys Tereshkovych Bilaniuk, a widely respected Ukrainian Catholic theologian and clergyman, died at the Copernicus Lodge Chronic Care Facility on September 8 after a lengthy battle with cancer. He was 66.

Born on August 4, 1932, in Zalischyky, Galicia (about 40 miles east of Kolomyia), he emigrated to Canada in 1949, settling initially in Toronto, then studied at the University of Montreal's theological seminary, graduating in 1955.

He continued his studies in Rome at the Pontifical University Urbanianum and the Pontifical Ukrainian Seminary until 1956, then traveled to Germany, where he earned a doctorate in theology from the University of Munich in 1961. He returned to Munich in 1971-1972 and earned a doctorate in philosophy from the Ukrainian Free University.

Dr. Bilaniuk joined the faculty of St. Michael's College at the University of Toronto in 1962 with the department of theology and religious studies, and was soon recognized as a leading authority on the theology, history and culture of the Eastern Christian Churches, with interests in interpretations of cosmic and biological evolution. He became a full professor in 1974.

He also served in various executive and administrative capacities of the college's Institute of Christian Thought beginning in 1969 onward.

Prof. Bilaniuk was a visiting professor of church history and theology at the John XXIII Institute for Eastern Christian Studies in New York, the Ukrainian Free University in Munich and the St. Clement Ukrainian Catholic University in Rome.

The Rev. Bilaniuk was ordained as a priest in April 1981 by Patriarch Josyf Slipyj and as mitrophoric archpriest in November 1988 by Bishop Isidore Borecky, and served as assistant pastor at the St. Nicholas parish in Toronto. In October 1985, he was appointed honorary canon of the Ukrainian Catholic Archeparchy in Lviv by Cardinal Myroslav Ivan Lubachivsky.

A staunch defender of the Ukrainian Catholic Church's particularity, both as a member of the Toronto Eparchy's clergy and as a member of the University of Toronto faculty, he arrayed scholarly canonical arguments in support of the Eastern Rite (such as the institution of married priesthood), and his Church's right to a patriarchate.

The Rev. Bilaniuk was also one of the most vocal of those clergymen who defended Bishop Borecky's decision not to step down as Eparch of Toronto and Eastern Canada in 1989 and 1995. Prior to his death the Rev. Bilaniuk was visited by Bishop Roman Danylak, the apostolic administrator for Toronto with whom he'd feuded, and the two formally reconciled.

In the 1990s, as a matter of principle, he served as an expert witness at trials in Québec defending the Church of Scientology in its claims to assert itself as a Church, and added his voice to protests against the German government's efforts to abridge its rights.

He authored over 160 articles and 13 books, including his first thesis, "De Magisterio Ordinario Pontificis" (1966); a two-volume collection of essays, "Studies in Eastern Christianity" (1977, 1982); "The Fifth Lateran Council (1512-1517) and the Eastern Churches" (his second thesis, 1975); "The Apostolic Origin of the Ukrainian Church" (1988); "The Spirituality of Eastern Churches" (1993); "Chronos and Kairos, Secular and Sacred Time in Relation to the History of Salvation and Eternity" (1994); and "The Notion of Religion of Christian and Pre-Christian Slavs, Fifth to 13th Centuries" (1994).

In 1966-1974 he was editor-in-chief of the journal Za Ridnu Tserkvu. He also served as an editorial advisor to the Journal of Ecumenical Studies, Horizons and Our Canada.

From 1993, Prof. Bilaniuk was a member of the editorial board of Logos, the journal of Eastern Christian Studies published by the Sheptytsky Institute at St. Paul University in Ottawa. He bequeathed his considerable personal library collection of about 10,000 titles to the institute's library.

In 1991, the University of Toronto Press published a monograph examining Prof. Bilaniuk's eschatological thought, and in the following year, a festschrift in his honor was published in Graz, Austria.

The Rev. Dr. Andriy Chirovsky, director of the Sheptytsky Institute, delivered the eulogy at the Rev. Bilaniuk's funeral. The Rev. Chirovsky told The Weekly in a telephone interview that the Rev. Bilaniuk was "a pioneer of Ukrainian theological scholarship," pointing out that prior to the Second Vatican Council in 1964, Ukrainian Catholic scholars were enjoined to work within the Western theological tradition.

"At the time of the Second Vatican Council [the Rev. Bilaniuk] had begun his career as an instructor, and was the among those who took the first steps in re-establishing Ukrainian Catholic theology on its Eastern foundations," Dr. Chirovsky said.

"Many will remember him for his controversial stands and his eccentricities," Dr. Chirovsky added, "but it should be remembered primarily that he was a pioneer. He took the Second Vatican Council at its word in its call for a return to the wellsprings of Eastern Christianity."

The Rev. Bilaniuk was a member of over 35 secular and theological scholarly societies, including the Shevchenko Scientific Society, the Medieval Academy of America, the North American Academy of Ecumenists, the Professors for World Peace Academy, the Global Congress of the World's Religions, the Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies (as an associate), the Canadian Theological Society, the Catholic Theological Society of America, the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, the International Society for Political Psychology, and the European Society for the Study of Science and Theology.

In 1966, he received the Gold Commemorative Medal of Ss. Peter and Paul from Pope Paul VI; he was listed in the International Who's Who of Intellectuals in 1976 and the Marquis Who's Who in the World in 1976 and 1980-1981; he received the Silver Pectoral Cross from Patriarch Slipyj in 1982; and in 1991 received the Albert Einstein Academy Foundation Medal for Peace.

Due to increasing illness, Prof. Bilaniuk was on leave from the University of Toronto since 1996 with the title of professor emeritus.

Funeral services were held on September 16 at the St. Nicholas Ukrainian Catholic Church, with Bishop Borecky and over 50 members of the clergy and monastic orders in attendance, with interment following at the Park Lawn Cemetery.

The Rev. Bilaniuk is survived by his wife, Marie Therese; sons Stefan, Nykolai (with wife Miroslawa), Michael and Joseph; grandchildren Olexa, Boris and Ksenia; brother, Jura; sister, Maria Dudas; and cousin, Olexa Myron Bilaniuk.

| Home Page |