Logos: A Journal of Eastern Christian Studies

Vol. 50 (2009) Nos. 1–2, pp. 1–5

Isidore Patrylo OSBM (1919–2008):

Basilian Protoarchimandrite,
Church Historian, and Bibliographer

The Basilians have always been a force to reckon with in

the Ukrainian Church. Until the early twentieth century they
represented the unique form of religious life in that part of the
Kyivan Church which was in full and visible communion with
Rome, having been transformed through progressive reforms
from ancient Orthodox monasticism into something more re-
miniscent of Western religious orders, especially the Jesuits.
There are many reasons why the Basilians have been so very
influential in ecclesial affairs. Some of them have to do with
astute attention to ecclesiastical property and the power
brokering that goes with episcopal appointments. Among the
characteristics of this religious order that most commentators
find indisputably positive are the perceived discipline of the
community and its combined intellectual achievements. Fr.
Isidore Patrylo was one of a number of representatives of a
whole generation of Ukrainian Basilians who earned that repu-
tation for their order through a lifetime of dedicated scholar-
ship.
Born the first of seven children on 30 November 1919 in
Sudova Vyshnia, roughly midway between L’viv and Prze-
my l, Ivan Patrylo studied at the boys’ school run by the Basi-
lians in Buchach, the Institute of Saint Josaphat. He entered the
community well before his fourteenth birthday, taking simple
vows at sixteen and perpetual vows in 1941, and was ordained
to the priesthood in 1942. After basic philosophical training at
the Basilian scholasticate in Krystinopil’ and the Roman-rite
seminary at Olomouc, in Moravia, he went on to continue his
studies in Prague at the Charles University as well as the
Ukrainian Free University. During 1943, Patrylo and several
Basilian confreres suffered several months of forced labour
under the Nazis.
2 Andriy Chirovsky

In 1944, Fr. Patrylo defended his first doctoral dissertation

at the Ukrainian Free University, on the pedagogy of the Kyiv-
Mohyla Academy, thus establishing one area of expertise that
would occupy him for decades to come. In 1953, he would
complete another doctorate at the Angelicum in Rome, this
time on the Mohyla Academy and Thomism in Ukraine. In
1961, he earned a third doctorate in canon law from the Late-
ran University, addressing the status of the Kyivan metropo-
litans from the perspective of Cleri Sanctitati.
After World War II, the young priest served Ukrainian
refugees in Germany, England, and Argentina, but the leader-
ship of the Basilian order was quick to notice his intellectual
abilities. Thus, in 1952 he was appointed personal secretary to
the Basilian general superior Teodosii Tyt Halushchynskyi.
Later he would become the general econome of the order, its
general procurator, general secretary and finally, in 1976, he
was elected to the first of two terms as protoarchimandrite, a
position he held until 1996.
In addition to spiritual and administrative responsibilities
within the Order of Saint Basil the Great (including tireless
visitations of Basilian houses worldwide, a number of trips to
Communist-occupied Eastern Europe, and several to Ukraine
beginning already in the 1960’s), Fr. Isidore dedicated himself
indefatigably to scholarly work. He was intimately involved
with the new Ukrainian translation of the Bible published by
the Basilians in 1963 as well as the Molytvoslov, the Ukrainian
translation of the Horologion published in various “in-house”
editions ad usum privatum over the years and definitively in
1990. The latter has become accepted by the Ukrainian Greco-
Catholic Church as the de facto text for the liturgy of the hours
in Ukrainian. It was under Patrylo’s direction that the Basilian
scholarly serial Analecta OSBM flourished, only to falter when
his own health failed in recent years. He also directed the pub-
lication of another series entitled «!"#$%&'("$ )*+,-&$
./.0/,12"$» [Ukrainian Spiritual Library].
An active member of the Ukrainian Theological Society,
the Shevchenko Scientific Society, and the Free Ukrainian
Academy of Arts and Sciences in the USA, Patrylo wrote
extensively. To be sure, his legacy includes several volumes of
Editorial 3

homiletic and catechetical materials, especially from many

years of contributing to the Basilian-run Ukrainian language
section of the Vatican Radio (which he, incidentally, directed
for a some months in the early 1950’s). But beyond this Patry-
lo wrote a number of books and scholarly papers in Ukrainian
Church history, the history of the Basilian order, historical
biography, and regular bibliographic surveys of literature re-
lating to the Ukrainian Church. 1 The latter work resulted in
three very valuable volumes (1975, 1988, 1992), the third of
which is incomplete. Materials for a fourth book in this series,
presumably the completion of volume three, have yet to be
published. His other works cover fields such diverse topics as
the influence of Christianity on legislation in Ukraine, the
life’s work of his predecessor at the Basilian helm, Athanasius
Welykyi, and the history of the Galician province of the Basi-
lian order – to name but a few.
On 1 December 1989, Mikhail Gorbachev met with Pope
John Paul II at the Vatican, desperate for a photo opportunity
in order to demonstrate to the world that he was a kinder, gent-
ler Bolshevik. Naturally, the Slavic pope had a few items of his
own on his shopping list that day, among them the decriminali-
zation of the Ukrainian Greco-Catholic Church. Gorbachev
had no choice but to cave in. Now Ukrainian Catholics had
already started to come out of the underground before this, but
what followed the decriminalization was simply astounding in
its proportions. Optimists might have predicted that tens, per-
haps even hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians would claim
allegiance to the long-banned Greco-Catholic Church. No one
seriously believed that five million people would do so.
But the Church that came cautiously out of the under-
ground had survived in carefully segmented portions, living
basically separate lives for their own – and each other’s –
good. There were Basilians with their structures, Redempto-
rists and Studites with theirs. I was present at a Divine Liturgy
early in 1990 where bishops of this Church were introducing
themselves to each other! The secular clergy were sometimes

1
3'4),# 3. 5$1#40,, !"#"$% & '&'$&()#%*&+ ,( &-.(#&/ 01#%/2-31(/
4"#156 [Sources and bibliography for the history of the Ukrainian Church]
Analecta OSBM series II, sectio I: Opera, vol. XXXIII (Rome, 1975).
4 Andriy Chirovsky

very closely allied with, but sometimes separate from, the

religious. And the whole picture became extremely complica-
ted when in the course of a few months nearly a thousand
priests formerly belonging to the Moscow patriarchate de-
clared themselves Greco-Catholic!
Fr. Patrylo was the protoarchimandrite of the Basilians at
this extremely delicate time. He and his general curia helped to
make it possible for some of the very hardened elements of the
Basilian order in Ukraine to come to terms with the new situa-
tion of their Church and to leave the pain of the past behind.
This is no small accomplishment. Under his administration the
Basilians in Ukraine and elsewhere in Eastern Europe moved
swiftly into a vast campaign of reclaiming and rebuilding an-
cient holdings and modernizing their structures and their
approaches so as to receive a great influx of vocations and to
become a much more positive force in a post-Vatican II
Church.
In 1995 Fr. Protoarchimandrite Isidore Patrylo paid a visit
to the Sheptytsky Institute. A man of great accomplishments,
he listened patiently and intently, with keen interest, to the
plans, hopes and dreams of the still fledgling institute at a time
when scepticism would have been, perhaps, a much more
realistic option. In the visitors’ book he wrote: “I am very
happy and very grateful to have had the opportunity to become
better acquainted with the Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytsky
Institute of Eastern Christian Studies and I wish all of its staff
the best of success.”
In the summer of 2001, Fr. Patrylo began to lose his eye-
sight. Within a few months the priest and scholar with a repu-
tation for his attention to detail would be rendered completely
blind. This was to be his fate for the remaining seven years of
his life, the last two of which he spent at the Basilian
Monastery of Saint Joseph in Briukhovychi near L’viv, where
he received Holy Communion for the last time on 27 October
2008 and shortly afterwards joined the Lord whom he had
served since childhood in the communion that will never again
be interrupted by the affairs of men. May his example serve to
inspire generations of Basilian monks and all who would serve
Editorial 5

through ascesis, dedicated leadership, and the love of learning.

May his memory be eternal! 6/7&$8 9$:’81(!

Andriy Chirovsky
Editor-in-Chief