Greek Catholic and Orthodox shrines in the Polish People’s Republic as examples of destroying and saving the cultural heritage of the frontier

Abstract

The shrine constituting the centre of spirituality was inseparable from the religious life of the Ukrainian people. The deportations of Ukrainians from the south-east of Poland in 1944–1947 exposed their churches to intentional and unintentional devastation. The communist authorities aimed to erase the traces of Ukrainian people in that area therefore they were not interested in preserving the abandoned Greek Catholic shrines. What is more, they even encouraged their demolition. One way to save them was allowing them to be taken over by the Roman Catholic Church. However, it often involved a change to their interior décor. The best solution was allowing them to be taken over by the Orthodox Catholic Church, or transferring them to open-air museums as museum objects.