Articles Concerning Union with the Roman Church (Articles of Brest)

The articles open with the sentence that the bishops require guarantees of them “from the Romans” before entering the union, and they close by entrusting them to two of their number, Hypatius Potij and Cyril Terletsky, to be confirmed by the pope and by the king of Poland. They are dated 1 June 1595 by the old calendar and carry the names of Michael, metropolitan of Kiev and Halych and all Rus’, and of the bishops of Volodymyr, Lutsk and Pinsk, with the seals of others.

The first articles concern faith and worship: the procession of the Holy Spirit is to be confessed as the Greek fathers taught it, “from the Father through the Son”; the liturgy, the sacraments and the church year are to stay as they were; priests may marry. The larger number concern the standing of the church in the Polish-Lithuanian state: free election of bishops from among their own people, seats in the senate, the return of church property, authority over monasteries, brotherhoods, schools and printing presses, and a ban on turning their churches into Latin ones or receiving their faithful into the Latin rite.

The articles state what the bishops asked, not what was granted. The pope’s answer is the bull recorded as Magnus Dominus et laudabilis nimis, which permits the eastern rites in general terms. Articles 14 and 32 ask that clergy who come from Greece claiming authority over them be kept out of the kingdom.