Today we celebrate the Feast of a martyr for unity, St. Josaphat. He was a native of Ruthenia. And where is/was Ruthenia? you are probably wondering. Ruthenians, also sometimes called Rusyns, among other names, belong to the same Slavic tribes as the ancient 'Rus of Ukraine/ Kyiv area. But they have their own heritage and history. The area they lived in was pretty much around Western Ukraine, Belarus, Czech Republic, Slovakia, etc. It was a pretty large area at one time. Like many other peoples they almost disappeared, but now they are reclaiming their heritage. Thanks to the work of St. Josaphat and others they struggled hard to remain united to the Pope. Unfortunately the efforts of Latin clergy to forcibly Latinize them (i.e. make them give up their Byzantine heritage) did more damage than did the efforts of some Orthodox clergy. You can read more about them at the Catholic Near East website.
(please note that Ruthenian is actually a Latinized form of Rusyn)
It is very interesting, but Ruthenia in the 17th century was the largest province (St. Hyacinth) in the whole Dominican Order, even larger than Spain! they had over 21 monasteries. These Dominicans were Ruthenian rite and worked hard to help the people remain faithful to their heritage and loyalty to the Pope. However in 1648 the new Greek Orthodox Patriarch had a special hatred for Catholics and he hired 200,000 Cossack troops to destroy the Dominicans in Ruthenian. In one year all these monasteries were destroyed and the Order gained over 500 martyrs. This didn't stop the Dominicans though! As soon as it was possible they began to build again. It wasn't until the Communist takeover after WWII that the Dominican Order disappeared from this area.
An important fact to mention is that Pope John Paul II's mother was a Ruthenian rite Catholic. They are very proud of this fact!
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