Head of the Department of External Church Relations for UGCC, President of the Ukrainian Catholic University.
Borys Gudziak was born in 1960 in Syracuse, NY to Ukrainian immigrants. He received degrees from Syracuse University, the Pontifical Urban University, and the Pontifical Oriental Institute. He holds a doctorate in Slavic and Byzantine Cultural and Ecclesiastical History from Harvard University.
He moved to Ukraine in 1992 to develop the Ukrainian Catholic University — the first Catholic University in the former Soviet Union. He taught in Ukraine for 20 years and lead the university for 12 years as rector. He has over 800 scholarly, analytic, and journalistic publications.
In 2012, Gudziak was ordained as Bishop of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church (UGCC) for France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxemburg, and Switzerland.
In 2019, Bishop Gudziak was enthroned as Metropolitan and Archbishop of Philadelphia for Ukrainian Catholics in the US.
You can download the current program in PDF format or view it directly on our website.
DownloadIs Ukrainian culture experiencing a genuine renaissance today, or merely a surge of interest driven by the war?
Ukraine is reclaiming its own names, history, and cultural heritage. At the same time, the rejection of Russian cultural influence raises a new question: what are we creating in its place, and what will Ukraine’s cultural identity look like in the decades to come?
How can we shape a contemporary Ukrainian cultural identity that resonates with a broad audience without compromising depth or quality? What does it take to ensure the sustainable development of culture — strong institutions, effective public policy, private investment, and a fully functioning cultural market? And how can we make Ukrainian culture internationally recognised not only because of the war, but for its own intrinsic value and ability to compete on the global stage?
These are the challenges and questions surrounding the future of Ukrainian culture that we will explore during the discussion “Culture in Wartime: Weapon, Therapy, or Foundation of Identity?”.