Eparch’s departure catches Slovak Catholics by surprise

Canada’s tiny Byzantine-rite Slovak diocese based in Toronto was shocked to learn it no longer had a bishop as of Oct. 20.

“I am chancellor, but I received this message exactly like everybody else in this world, six in the morning. He resigned and we have an apostolic administrator,” said Fr. Marik Novinsky. “I had no idea he would resign.”

Mar Marian Andrej Pacák, eparch of the Eastern-rite diocese of Cyril and Methodius, resigned as bishop and Bishop Kurt Burnette of Passaic, N.J., has been appointed apostolic administrator. 

The sudden change has inspired a flood of unfounded speculation on social media about the reasons for his departure. There’s no basis for any of it, Novinsky said.

“I know that he had perhaps a tough time,” said the priest who worked closely with Pacák. “He’s from Slovakia and came to this country and he didn’t speak English. But I had no idea that this would happen.”

In a 2018 interview with The Catholic Register shortly after Pacák arrived in Canada, Novinsky acted as the new bishop’s interpreter. Pacák joked about the perverse difficulty of English, a language that seemed to him to have no rules.

Pacák left Canada for a scheduled vacation in Slovakia in mid-January. He was also planning to renew his religious worker visa, which was due to expire. While in Slovakia, Poland and Slovakia closed their borders in response to COVID-19. A week later, Canada closed its border to all unnecessary travel.

“He had a flight from Warsaw, but already Poland was closed — the airport was closed,” explained Novinsky.

Slovak Byzantine Catholics are perhaps best known in Canada for the massive Cathedral of the Transfiguration looming on the edge of Unionville, Ont., just north of Toronto. Built by the Roman family, which amassed wealth from uranium mining in Northern Ontario, the cathedral became a point of contention within Canada’s Slovak community. In 2006 Eparch John Pazak removed the blessed sacrament and the antimension, or altar stone, from the cathedral and forbade his priests from celebrating Mass there. The seat of the diocese reverted to St. Mary’s Byzantine Slovak Church on Shaw Street in downtown Toronto.

Since the eparchy of just four parishes was erected by St. Pope John Paul II in 1980, St. Cyril and Methodius has twice been through long periods without a bishop. After founding Bishop Michael Rusnak retired in 1996, the bishop’s chair remained vacant until 2000, when Bishop John Pazak was appointed.

With Pazak’s appointment to the Eparchy of Holy Mary of Protection of Phoenix of the Ruthenians in Phoeniz, Ariz., in 2016, Sts. Cyril and Methodius was again without a bishop until 2018.

“It’s a shock, but we will go through this,” said Novinsky.