Conflict of Bishops Inokentii Vynnytskyi and Yan Malakhovskyi Around the Union Church

Abstract

The purpose of this research is to analyze one of the problems that have counterposed the Church of Rome to the Warsaw court during the Early Modern Period, specifically related to the question of Ukrainians Uniat. It is an issue that this investigation addresses through a case study that emerges clearly within the correspondence exchanged – especially in 1691 – between Jan III Sobieski and the Protector of the Kingdom, Cardinal Carlo Barberini.

The systematic and critical reading of these missives, kept in the Vatican Apostolic Library, combined with some documents preserved in the archive of the Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, is the method we used to reflect on the tensions existing between the courts of Rome and Warsaw around the Ukrainian Uniats. The central theme of the correspondence was the dispute arose between the uniat bishop Malakhovskyi and Vynnytskyi, bishop who recently had left the schism to embrace Catholicism. Both had been destined for the pastoral care of the same bishopric, but the first had been appointed by Rome, the second one by the King. Immediately the cohabitation became extremely difficult to manage. This conflict – arose after a reprimand made by Malakhovskyi to Vynnytskyi who was not demonstrating loyalty to Catholicpractices, – hid more complex dynamics. These concerned the royal privileges, the prerogatives of the Church of Rome and the influence of the neighboring patriarchate of Moscow, to be considered within a very strategical territory such as Ukraine at that time. Reconstruction of the course and nature of the conflict generates a scholar novelty of the study.

Conclusion. For many years, this problem engaged the Sacred Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, the apostolic nuncios at the Polish court and Jan III Sobieski, all of them interested in finding a satisfactory solution to the dispute between the two bishops. The dualism between Malakhovskyi and Vynnytskyi was a very complex deal that threatened to break the diplomatic relations existing between the Polish and roman courts, endangering even the basis of the Union of Brest.