Sviato Pokrova 2012

Today, October 14, is a festive day for Ukrainians everywhere.  Whether you are involved in church life, or a patriot, this is the Day of Ukrainian Cossacks.  Like many things in the Ukrainian life, today has many layers of complexity. 

Today is Pokrova, the day recognizing the act of intercession of the Theotokos, the Blessed Virgin Mary, over the people of the Blachernae church in Constantinpole.  According to Eastern Orthodox Sacred Tradition, in the tenth century on this day, St. Andrew the Blessed Fool for Christ, rose for prayers, and at four in the morning, he saw the dome of the Blachernae church open and the Virgin Mary enter, moving in the air above him, surrounded by the Holy Angels and Saints. She knelt and prayed with tears for all the faithful. St. Andrew and his disciple St. Epiphanius saw it, and the people were amazed.

In the same spirit, the Virgin Mary has appeared in various sites in Ukraine, and over the centuries has become the protector of Ukraine. 

Pokrova is also tied to the Ukrainian Insurgent Army UPA and has indeed become a day recognizing the struggle for national liberation.  But complexity its is by-line. 
Of course, history is all dependent upon who writes the words.  As I have recently read in the book Bloodlands by Timothy Snyder, people don't frequently have many choices during war, and during the course of Ukraine's last century (and for many before it seems) the people have been vulnerably between a rock and a hard place.  Difficult to choose options when you have none, and yet somehow the world goes on. 

The Ukrainian political movements of the 1920's and 1930's were fighting foreign and domestic enemies.  The organization mentioned above was formed to protect the people from repression and exploitation by the various "ruling bodies", and drive to the goal of an independent, free and unified state.  Extremely difficult circumstances dictated the acceptance of violence as an acceptable tool.  Hindsight is 20/20, and historians can interpret the strategic errors those in the trenches were too busy to sort out. 

Тарас Петрененко Україна
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4bF-hynOwRA&feature=share

Warrior heritage of Ukrainian Cossacks
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7rqdQ7dgCM&feature=share

 

http://ukrainiancalgary.blogspot.ca/2012/10/giving-thanks_7.htmlFor Ukraine, for its diaspora, for Ukrainians everywhere, on this October 14th, whether you like red borsch, green or white, greetings on this day of Pokrova!  (The photo is from Edmonton's Borsch Fest 2012 - wish I 'd had the chance to attend!

http://ukrainiancalgary.blogspot.ca/2012/07/borshch-fest-ukrainian-male-chorus.html






 

Giving Thanks

Breaking bread, communing with friends and family, we take this opportunity to give thanks.  Thanks, for the plenty on our tables; thanks, for living in a place of confidence, optimism and economic opportunity; thanks, for angels among us who teach, heal, serve, give generously, witness, and pray; thanks, for times to hope and dream, to love.  Calgary has much to celebrate this Thanksgiving. Vibrant Ukrainian programs for young people, Ukrainian dancing, culture programs, language classes, social club, spiritual homes to choose from, and purposeful opportunities to make a difference - it is hard not to see the lovely life we have created here.

Ukraine is, at this moment, facing tough decisions about its future.  While the diaspora may grumble about the weather and politics, people in the ancestral homeland have lived with less optimism.  One indicator is the fact that so many new immigrants from Ukraine have assertively sought to establish themselves in Calgary's cradle of economic opportunity.  They are glad to be here, glad to contribute to Canada, glad to receive the gifts of good education, health, economic freedoms, that lack at home.  We can collectively acknowledge that, though life here isn't perfect, and it may be human nature to complain, every now and then we should open our eyes, take an opportunity to speak to the new people to our city, and ask the interesting questions.  Given the choices, why here?

In the summer I had a chat with my friend Bohdanna from Montreal.  Understanding my love of reading she recommended a new book. Recently I picked it up, Bloodlands by Timothy Snyder.  It's not an easy read, but an excellent one.  Snyder carefully explains the many twists and turns that have befallen the Ukrainian (and other) ancestral homelands this past century.  And in trying to fathom the deeds, the mindset of those people who dominated Ukrainian history in the 1900's, who wickedly imposed inhuman, beastily tactics to shape the world in a manner to benefit the few and bereft the many, to....I am at a loss for words.  The English language simply doesn't have a sufficiently descriptive word to describe this evil.  Perhaps our level of morality dictates that such a word not exist. My curious mind wants to understand how and why...... 

How fortunate to live here, and now!  Ukraine will choose its path forward, in elections later this October,  while its Calgary diaspora lovingly gazes upon our families, generously sharing the good fortune that comes of sober thinking, serious consideration, and wise choices.  GIVING THANKS!