On May 25–26, 2026, the XXXVI International Scientific Conference "History of Religions in Ukraine" was held, organized by the Lviv Museum of the History of Religion in cooperation with the M.S. Hrushevsky Institute of Ukrainian Archaeography and Source Studies of the NAS of Ukraine, the H.S. Skovoroda Institute of Philosophy of the NAS of Ukraine, the I. Krypiakevych Institute of Ukrainian Studies of the NAS of Ukraine, and the Ihor Skochylas Center for Religious Culture of the Ukrainian Catholic University.
Welcoming remarks to the participants of the scientific event were made by the head of the Department of Religious Studies at the H.S. Skovoroda Institute of Philosophy of the NAS of Ukraine, Doctor of Philosophical Sciences Oleksandr Sahan (Kyiv), president of the Ukrainian Association of Religious Scholars, Doctor of Philosophical Sciences Liudmyla Filipovych (Kyiv), director of the I. Krypiakevych Institute of Ukrainian Studies of the NAS of Ukraine, Doctor of Historical Sciences Ihor Soliar (Lviv), and director of the Lviv Museum of the History of Religion Orest Malyts.
The plenary session addressed current issues regarding the state of socio-religious relations in Ukraine, challenges faced by the Church and the state under current conditions. In her report, Liudmyla Filipovych emphasized that under present circumstances, the Church, in addition to its traditional religious and spiritual callings, has another extremely important mission – to become the voice of the people, conveying their needs, expectations, and hopes to the authorities. The Church, according to the scholar, should be the conscience of the nation, responding to various, primarily moral, challenges.
It has become a tradition to dedicate presentations to significant anniversary events. This year, these include the Union of Brest of 1596 and the Lviv Pseudo-Synod of 1946. The genesis of church union in the context of the secular and spiritual authorities of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was illuminated by Professor Leonid Tymoshenko, Doctor of Historical Sciences, from the Ivan Franko Drohobych Pedagogical University. Contemporary challenges for researchers of the Lviv Pseudo-Synod of 1946 were discussed by Associate Professor Taras Bublyk, Candidate of Historical Sciences, from the Institute of Church History of the Ukrainian Catholic University (Lviv).
The features of the Lviv school of Ukrainian religious painting of the first half of the 16th century were characterized by Senior Research Fellow Volodymyr Aleksandrovych, Doctor of Historical Sciences, from the I. Krypiakevych Institute of Ukrainian Studies of the NAS of Ukraine. The role of Metropolitan Andrey Sheptytsky in organizing the Council of the Russian Greek Catholic Church in Petrograd in 1917 and the significance of this event were revealed in the report by Deputy Director for Scientific Work of the Lviv Museum of the History of Religion, Candidate of Historical Sciences Oleksandra Kyrychuk.
The program of the event included sessions on: "Sacred Space of Antiquity: Archaeology, Myths, Monuments," "History of Church Life from the 17th to the Early 20th Century," and "Religious Discourse in the Context of Political Upheavals and Institutional Transformations of the 20th–21st Centuries."
More than 50 scholars from Lviv, Kyiv, Drohobych, Ivano-Frankivsk, Uzhhorod, as well as from abroad, including from Rzeszów (Poland), participated in the conference.
According to information from the M.S. Hrushevsky Institute of Ukrainian Archaeography and Source Studies of the NAS of Ukraine
