Head of the UGCC asked faithful to pray for a successful Patriarch’s Synod

From November 29 to December 9, 2009, meetings of the Synod of Bishops of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church will take place in Lviv. The main theme of the synod will be evangelization. At the synod, according to His Beatitude Lubomyr, a strategy of evangelization for the whole church not only in Ukraine but also in the settlements will be worked out. “The first task of the church is to evangelize, to spread the Gospel. We will consider how to do it better, how to prepare to it, what understanding there should be. In fact, by the force of baptism we are called to evangelization,” said the head of the UGCC.  “The synod is an important moment in the life of the church and those who are aware of it, who expect something from it, we ask to prayer so the Lord gives the synod’s fathers, the 49 of them, His illumination so that the resolutions of the synod are beneficial for our church and so that the people willingly use it for the own benefit and for the benefit of our people,” said His Beatitude Lubomyr as he called the faithful to pray for a successful synod. The head of the UGCC substantiated the importance of prayer by stating: “A synod is not a parliament where something is decided with the majority of votes. A synod is a search for the Divine Will by those entrusted to the church – the bishops. Therefore they jointly with prayer search that which is needed for the church.”  In addition, His Beatitude Lubomyr thanked those who took part in its preparation by writing letters with opinions and propositions regarding the main theme of the synod. “We are thankful to all who sent their opinions about evangelization. They are carefully studied and included in the materials of the synod. Although it is unfortunate that this year a significantly fewer number of people took part in the preparation of the main theme of the synod,” he said.

Information Department of the UGCC