Eparch Ken Nowakowski installs Ukrainian priest in Surrey
By Brent Mattson
The B.C. Catholic

VANCOUVER--Ukrainian Catholic priests are difficult to come by in B.C., so Eparch (Bishop) Ken Nowakowski of New Westminster went directly to the source, picking up Father Andrii Chornenkyi in his native Ukraine.

During a pilgrimage to the Ukraine, the eparch went to St. Anne’s parish in Lviv to find a suitable priest.

After some pushback from the local pastor, the youthful Father Chornenkyi made his way to the Lower Mainland and was installed as parochial administrator of Exaltation of the Holy Cross Parish in Surrey Nov. 27.

Eparch Nowakowski celebrated Divine Liturgy, with Father Chornenkyi and Father Yuriy Vyshnevskyy, rector of Holy Eucharist Cathedral, concelebrating.

“Father Andrii was serving one of the most centrally located parishes in Lviv,” Eparch Nowakowski said. “If that parish was in Vancouver, it would probably be where the Hyatt Hotel is.”

He said St. Anne’s has more than 6,000 parishioners, and joked that Father Chornenkyi had to learn all their names. He said he’s sure the new pastor will find it a bit of an adjustment to get to know all the parishioners at the tightly-knit Surrey parish.

The Knights of Columbus were on hand during the ceremony. They and Holy Cross parishioners had helped to prepare the parish for the new pastor and his family, fixing the railings and the windows on the church and cleaning the priest’s house.

The previous pastor of Holy Cross, Father Theodosius Machinski, moved to St. Nicholas the Wonderworker Parish in Victoria.

Father Chornenkyi arrived in Canada with his wife Halyna and children Svyatoslav and Sofiya just one week before his installation. “They’re more or less over the jet lag and starting to adjust,” Eparch Nowakowski told Holy Cross parishioners. “With your love and your support of him, I think you will find that he’s a wonderful person.”

At the end of the installation, Father Chornenkyi thanked the parishioners for their prayers and said he hopes to see more of them.

“What I want and very much expect from you is to see you here every Sunday to pray with me, and together we will follow Jesus,” he said. “I am afraid to give any promises, because the more promises you give, the less you do.”

After the ceremony Eparch Nowakowksi joked about his high expectations for the new pastor.

“I told (the parishioners) before you were here that you were almost like Jesus,” he said. “If you can’t walk on water today, we expect it by tomorrow.”