ДРУЖИНИ РЕПРЕСОВАНИХ СВЯЩЕННИКІВ МУКАЧІВСЬКОЇ ГРЕКО-КАТОЛИЦЬКОЇ ЄПАРХІЇ

The article examines the fate of the wives of priests of the Mukachevo Greek Catholic Diocese, who suffered as a result of the forced liquidation of the church structure in 1949. The Mukachevo Greek Catholic Diocese retained its dominant position until the fall of 1944, when the old government was replaced by the Soviet regime. This process was accompanied by the forcible establishment of one-party power, nationalization, industrialization, collectivization, and mass repressions from 1945. The change of power coincided with the appointment of a new bishop, Bishop Teodor Romzhi, who defended the interests of the diocese together with the clergy. As part of the anti-church policy, the NKVD arrested 127 Greek Catholic clergy who refused to renounce unity with the Catholic Church and transfer to the jurisdiction of the Russian Orthodox Church. The focus of the study is not on the repressed priests themselves, but on their wives, who, after the arrests of their husbands, were left without support and suffered discrimination, persecution, loss of social status and means of livelihood. The relevance of the topic is due to the need to expand the ideas about the mechanisms of Soviet repressions, which covered not only the clergy, but also their family members. The wives of priests became objects of social pressure: they lost the right to work, were forced to change their place of residence and were under constant surveillance. Despite these difficulties, they maintained their faith, spiritually supported their husbands and children and contributed to the preservation of Christian traditions in the private sphere. In many cases, these women became the moral support for their families in conditions of systemic violence. The study attempted to create a list of the wives of repressed priests of the Mukachevo diocese. The results of the study may be useful for further studies in the fields of church history, women's studies and research on totalitarianism