Religious and National Conflict between Poland and Ukraine. (Based on online records.)
These tensions can be divided into respective key areas:
1. Social and political inequality. No seats in the Senate: After the conclusion of the Brest Union (1596) the bishops of the unice were to sit in the legislature of the Republic on equal terms with the Roman Catholics. The king and the Latin magnate never allowed this, which degraded the Unity elite. Worse Clergy Status: The Roman Catholic clergy enjoyed tremendous privileges and immunities, while the mediocre Unitian clergy (often married children) were treated by the Polish nobility almost like peasants of the country.
2. Latinization processes (loss of identity)Propulsion of patterns: Roman Catholics frequently considered the Latin rite to be “better”. The units were forced to take over Western traditions (e.g. introduction of organs, benches to the church, elimination of iconostasis or change of liturgical robes). The inferiority complex: any Unities themselves decided to latinate or completely change the rite to Latin (polonization) to escape the stigma of inferior social status.
3. Conflicts over the faithful and wealth. Picking up parishioners: Between the Roman Catholic and Unity parishes there were constant disputes over boundaries, tithes, and about which church the children of mixed marriages belong.
The ban on the transition to Unity: The law of the Republic allowed the unites to go to Latin rites, but strictly prohibited Roman Catholics from accepting the Unitem. The Roman Church treated evasiveness as a ‘transitional station’ to the full latinization of the Russian population.
4. National and political dimension (XIX and 20th century)National division: In time, the Roman Catholic rite became a synonym of Polishness, while the Uniite (Greek Catholic) became the foundation of Ukrainian identity.
Insurgency: During the Polish national uprisings in the 19th century, the Unic hierarchy (especially in Galicia under partitions) frequently maintained loyalty to the Tsar or Emperor of Austria, which the Poles-Catholics considered treason.
Apogee in the 20th century: The Polish-Ukrainian conflict in 1918–1947 moved these tensions to the level of bloody fighting. The Roman Catholic part accused Greek Catholic clergy of supporting nationalists from UPA, while Ukrainians saw in the Polish Church the tool of brutal polonization and oppression.
It was only the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965) that officially condemned the alleged unionism as a method of forced subordination of east structures and equalized all Catholic rites in law, which began to slow put out the old sentiments.
