Blessed Nicholas was born in 1884.  Following his ordination in 1909 he taught in the seminary.  In 1919 he entered the Redemptorist Congregation.  He was consecrated bishop in 1931.  On 11th April 1945 he was arrested, accused of being "an agent of the Vatican" and condemned forced labour in Siberia.  Despite torture and interrogation he found ways of comforting his fellow prisoners.

Released in 1956 at the point of death he made an unexpected partial recovery and from his sick bed guided the Ukrainian Catholic Church which had survived underground.  He died on 2nd April 1959, at the age of 75.

Nicholas Charnetskyi was born on 14th December 1884 in the Western Ukrainian village of Semakivci.  He was the eldest of nine children.  Nicholas received his primary education in the village of Tovmach and then entered St. Nicolas gymnasium (grammar school) in Stanislaviv (now Ivano-Frankivsk).

Charnetskyi discovered his vocation to the priesthood at a young age and soon declared his intention of becoming a priest.  In 1903 bishop Gregory Khomyshyn sent him to Rome for studies.  During Charnetskyi’s short visit to Ukraine, Bishop Khomyshyn ordained him a priest on 2nd October 1909.  Fr. Nicholas then returned to Rome to continue his studies and received the degree of doctor of theology.

From the autumn of 1910 Fr. Charnetskyi was professor of philosophy and dogmatic theology at the Stanislaviv seminary.  He was also the spiritual director in the same seminary.  Deep in his heart, however, he longed for community life.  Hence, in October 1919 he joined the Redemptorist novitiate in Zbojiska near Lviv, and one year later, on 16th of October 1920, he professed his vows as a Redemptorist.

Filled with eagerness to work for the reconciliation of Christians and to convert the spiritually abandoned people, the Redemptorists of the Lviv Province founded, in 1926, a missionary centre at Kovel in the Volyn region.  Fr. Charnetskyi, being an ardent missionary, was sent there.  Very soon he gained the utmost respect of the local people and even that of the Orthodox clergy.  Having opened a monastery and a church in Kovel, Fr. Nicholas did his best to preserve the purity of the Eastern Liturgical rite.  In 1931, taking into account Fr. Charnetskyi's devoted work, Pope Pius XI appointed him titular bishop of Lebed and an Apostolic Visitor for the Ukrainian Catholics in the Volyn and Polissia regions.  These regions became the field of Charnetskyi's activity - first as a missionary, then as a bishop - for almost 14 years.

As the first Redemptorist Ukrainian bishop he experienced persecution from the very outset of his activity.  During the Soviet occupation of Western Ukraine in 1939 the Redemptorists were forced to leave the Volyn region, and bishop Charnetskyi moved to the Redemptorist monastery in Lviv.

After the revival of the Lviv Theological Academy in 1941, Bishop Nicholas Charnetskyi joined the faculty of the Academy as a professor of philosophy, psychology, and moral theology.  His calmness, based on a strong and unshakable faith, his spirit of obedience and prayer gave his students good reason to consider their professor a saint.  Bishop Nicholas Charnetskyi was for them an exemplary figure both as a priest and a virtuous person.

In 1944 the Soviet troops entered Galicia for the second time.  This marked the beginning of Bishop Charnetskyi's road to Calvary.  He was arrested on 11th April 1945 and held in the prison of the Soviet secret police.  There, the bishop suffered many afflictions: interrogations in the middle of the night, cruel beatings and torture.  Later Bishop Charnetskyi was transferred to Kiev, where he spent another year of suffering - until his case was taken to court.  Bishop Nicholas Charnetskyi was sentenced to ten years of imprisonment for the crime of being a "Vatican agent".  He served this term together with the Metropolitan Yosyf Slipyj first in the town of Mariinsk in the Kemerovo region (Siberia) where he worked in coalmines.

According to credible sources, during the period of his imprisonment (from his arrest in Lviv in April 1945 until his release in 1956), Bishop Charnetskyi spent altogether 600 hours under torture and interrogations, and at different times was imprisoned in 30 different camps and forced-labour prisons.  Despite all these sufferings, the bishop always managed to find a word of consolation for his fellow prisoners.  He supported them morally and he knew all of them by name.  It is no wonder that bishop Charnetskyi was very popular among the prisoners, as he was the only source of consolation for them.

Bishop Nicholas spent the last years of his imprisonment in a prison hospital in Mordovia.  In 1956 his health had so deteriorated that the doctors felt there was no hope for him, even a special robe, in which the prisoners were buried, had already been prepared for him.  Taking into account the hopeless condition of the bishop and so that the Soviet regime might avoid being blamed for causing his death, the prison administration decided to release him and send him to Lviv.  After his return to Lviv in 1956 and due to his contracting hepatitis and a number of other diseases, Bishop Charnetskyi was immediately hospitalised, everybody was sure that he would soon die.  But, the Lord had a different plan: he decided to prolong the life of a man whose faith and work was so valued and needed by the Ukrainian Church.  Soon the bishop recovered enough and was moved to an apartment together with Br. Klymentiy, C.Ss.R.  There, Bishop Charnetskyi continued his apostolate of endurance and prayer.  He spent most of his time praying and reading even though he was almost blind.  During his stay in Lviv, Bishop Charnetskyi remained faithful to his mission of a Good Shepherd: he supported his confreres spiritually, prepared candidates for the priesthood and ordained more than ten priests.

Unfortunately, Bishop Charnetskyi's "miraculous" recovery did not last long.  On 2nd April 1959 the bishop died.  His last words were a cry calling on the aid of Our Mother of Perpetual Help.  The funeral of Bishop Nicholas took place on the 4th April 1959.  The description of the funeral kept in the archive of Yorkton Province of the C.Ss.R (Canada) ends with the following words: "We all think that the day of his canonisation will come - for he was indeed a saintly bishop".

Everybody who knew bishop Nicholas Charnetskyi gave unanimous testimony of his sainthood.  It was no surprise then that immediately after his death many people started addressing their prayers to Bishop Charnetskyi.  Numerous people visit the place of his burial to obtain his intercession when praying to God for various favours.  One woman, whose arm was about to be amputated, applied soil from the bishop's grave to her arm, which resulted in a complete healing.  Since then, people have been taking soil from his grave to remedy various diseases.

Taking into account the testimonies of Bishop Nicholas Charnetskyi's virtuous life, and particularly his endurance, courage and faithfulness to Christ's Church during the period of persecution, the beatification process was started in 1960.  On 2nd March 2001 the process was completed at eparchy (diocesan) level and the case was handed over to the Apostolic See.  On 6th April 2001 the theological committee recognized the fact of bishop Charnetskyi's martyrdom, on 23rd April his martyrdom was verified by the Assembly of Cardinals, and on 24th April 2001 the Holy Father, John Paul II, signed the decree for the beatification of Bishop Nicholas Charnetskyi, a blessed martyr of Christian faith.  Bishop Nicholas together with 25 companions, including three Redemptorists, were beatified on 27th June 2001.

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Some points of interest for Irish people.

The first time Irish people would have become acquainted with Bishop Nicholas Charnetskyi was in 1932 when he visited Dublin for the International Eucharistic Congress.  During the Congress week he was the guest of the Redemptoristine Nuns at St. Alphonsus Monastery, Drumcondra, Dublin, and offered the Greek-Catholic Divine Liturgy (Mass) every morning in their chapel.  On the second day of the Congress, Bishop Nicholas offered a solemn Divine Liturgy in the Jesuit Church on Gardner Street in Dublin.

While in Dublin he visited the Redemptorist community in Marianella, Rathgar, Dublin where he was photographed with a group of Redemptorists who had attended the Congress.  After the Congress Bishop Nicholas visited the Redemptorists in Limerick and Esker.  On 1st July 1932 he offered the Divine Liturgy in Mount Saint Alphonsus Church, Limerick and afterwards he travelled to the west to meet our students at the House of Studies in Esker, Athenry.

Bishop Nicholas was the first Redemptorist Greek-Catholic Bishop and the first Greek-Catholic Bishop to visit Ireland.  So far as is known, he was the first to offer the Greek-Catholic Divine Liturgy in this country.

On 8th September 2002 at Dublin’s Pro-Cathedral, Patriarch Gregory III consecrated an icon to Hieromartyr Nicholas and St. Patrick for the Greek-Catholic Congregation in Dublin.  This icon is in St. Kevin’s Oratory, which is attached to the Pro-Cathedral.

Following the Congress the well known English writer, G.K. Chesterton, wrote a small book commemorating the Congress and on page 23 he refers to Bishop Nicholas but without naming him: “Or again; I have been to Palestine; and I saw many Greek priests in Palestine.  But I have never seen a man dressed as a Greek priest when he was actually a Roman priest.  But the distinguished representative of the Roman obedience, who had come all the way from Russia, looked exactly like any orthodox priest of the old Byzantine Church of Muscovy; wearing the strange Rabbinical headdress and the imposing beard, which gives a nameless touch as of something Assyrian, something primeval and patriarchal, to the stiff and stately patriarchs; as if the great Basilica were supported by winged bulls instead of cherubim.  Yet this man was an ordinary Papist like any other; like myself or the nearest gutter-boy in Dublin.  “Christendom in Dublin”, London, Sheed & Ward, MCMXXXII.

There are also references to his visit in “Two Hundred Years with the Redemptorists” which was published in 1933 to commemorate the second centenary of the founding of the Redemptorists in 1732.

The next public reference to him was in the January-February 1946 issue of the Redemptorist Record, page 13.