Harasevych, Mykhailo

Harasevych, Mykhailo [Гарасевич, Михайло; Harasevyč, Myxajlo], b 23 May 1763 in Yaktoriv, Zolochiv county, Galicia, d 29 April 1836 in Lviv. Baron of Neustern, church historian, and prominent Galician religious figure. He studied theology at the Barbareum in Vienna. In 1787 he was given the Chair of Pastoral Theology in Lviv, and later also taught in Studium Ruthenum; he was twice vicar-general of the Lviv eparchy. Through his efforts in Vienna and the Vatican the Halych metropoly of the Ukrainian Catholic church was restored in 1806, the Lviv kapitula was recognized, and the church became equal to and completely independent of the Polish Roman Catholic church. After the death of Metropolitan Antin Anhelovych in August 1814, Harasevych administered Halych metropoly until the appointment of Metropolitan Mykhailo Levytsky in March 1816. Harasevych is the author of Annales Ecclesiae Ruthenae (1862), a documented history of the Ukrainian Catholic church, in which he defended the church’s status from a historico-legal position.

[This article was updated in 2021.]