Kovpak grew up when the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church was the world's largest illegal religious organization. According to Vlad Naumescu, Kovpak studied theology in a clandestine seminary run by Basilian monks. He headed the Basilian Third Order, which Naumescu has described as, "an uncompromisingly radical group of Greek Catholics, which did not accept any relation to Orthodoxy, 'reunited' priests, or the Soviet State." Kovpak left the Basilian Order, however, soon after being ordained to the priesthood in 1990, "having observed that the community was altering the tradition it had fought so hard to preserve during the underground era, now adapting to the general tendency of church renewal."
Dispute with Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church authorities
On 10 February 2004, Cardinal Lubomyr Husar, Archbishop of Lviv and Major Archbishop of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, declared that Kovpak, through his close links to the SSPX, had incurred excommunication by "recognis the uncanonical foreign Bishop Bernard Fellay, who does not recognise the authority of the Pope of Rome and is not united with the Catholic Church." Kovpak denied that he recognised Bishop Fellay as his own canonical bishop, and declared his intention to appeal to the Vatican. The Holy See accepted his appeal and declared the excommunication null for lack of canonical form.
Excommunication
Kovpak was definitively excommunicated in November 2007 after having the Latin-Rite SSPX bishop Richard Williamson ordain two priests and seven deacons for his society in spite of the prohibition in of the Code of Canon Law.
Kovpak's response
To justify his actions and respond to the accusations levelled against him by the leaders of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, Kovpak wrote a book entitled Persecuted Tradition. In it, he charged that bishops have harassed traditional Greek Catholic priests and refused Ukrainian laity Holy Communion because of the laity insisting on kneeling for it. He also accused the UGCC leaders of having publicly posed for photographs and conducted interreligious payer meetings with Buddhists and Hare Krishnas. He further cited virulently Anti-Catholic remarks by the Orthodox prelates with whom Cardinal Husar is pursuing ecumenism and "is seeking a false unity". The SSPX is preparing an English translation of the book, the original of which is in Ukrainian.
Lifting of the Écône excommunications
While the excommunication of the four bishops whom Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre consecrated in spite of the prohibition of was, at their request, lifted in January 2009, Kovpak has not sought to have his own excommunication in connection with two other canons of the Code of Canon Law lifted by the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church or by the Holy See.
Parish church
The Society of St. Josaphat holds possession of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic parish church inthe village of Ivano-Frankove, which is seen as their national headquarters. Those who support the Archeparch of Lviv have to celebrate the Divine Liturgy in the Latin Rite church.
