SPEECH AT ST. PATRICK’S CATHEDRAL IN NEW YORK

Your Excellency, Archbishop Terrance J. Cooke,

Your Excellencies, most Reverend Archbishop and Bishops,

right Reverend and very Reverend Monsignori, Reverend Fathers, Venerable Sisters

beloved in Christ,

First of all I wish to thank you, your Excellency, Archbishop Cooke, for the kindness shown to me and to my people, kindness occasioned by my visit to this great land of America, in being able to offer the divine liturgy of the sacrifice of calvary in this magnificent cathedral. It is an honor for me and for the Ukrainian people.

I am also grateful to the United States of America where my Ukrainian Brethren immigrated at various times in the past seventy five years. Here they sought and found haven against the storms of economic, political and religious persecution. Here they were able to find work and due recompense for work, here they found freedom to worship god in their own manner, in their own language and rite. Here in this great land of America they were free to develop their own talents and culture. No one can understand and appreciate this better than a people that has been deprived of these god-given rights.

America has from the beginning been the promised land of persecuted peoples. She calls out to all other nations: "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free. (Give me) the wretched refuse of your teeming shores, send these, the homeless, tempest tossed to me. I lift my lamp beside the golden door."

This nation and its government were founded upon faith in God and upon the basic rights inherent in human nature, life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness under nature's god, as the forefathers of this blessed land declared. And America seeks these rights for all peoples of the earth. Indeed, all nations have taken an example from America, seek her help in attaining these God-given rights. And your country, blessed so abundantly by the Father of all, has always sought to give this assistance in so many ways through her wonderful democratic system.

Democracy demands gentility, courtesy, a decorum of conduct which respects the rights of every man. This gentlemanliness is Christianity in action. When this is lacking in the spiritual structure of a society, democracy cannot function.

Today, we thank almighty god for this great land and people and pray that its basic christian spirit of Christ-like gentleness continue to grow for the glory of God, the happiness of this nation and all nations on the earth.

May God continue to bless America, the land of freedom, the land of opportunity, the haven of oppressed peoples from all regions of God's earth.