A New Bishop Appointed for the Eparchy of Saint Volodymyr the Great in Paris

On October 1, 2025, the Vatican announced that His Holiness Pope Leo XIV, after blessing the decision of the Synod of Bishops of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, appointed Fr. Ihor Rantsya, the current protosyncellus, as the ruling bishop of the Eparchy of St. Volodymyr the Great, based in Paris.

This was reported by the Holy See Press Office.

The Eparchy of St. Volodymyr the Great in Paris became vacant after Pope Francis appointed its first eparch, Borys Gudziak, as Metropolitan of Philadelphia in 2019, and Bishop Hlib Lonchyna, bishop emeritus of the Eparchy of the Holy Family in London, as apostolic administrator of the vacant see. Father Ihor Rantsya will become the second eparch of the Paris Eparchy, which encompasses five countries: France, Switzerland, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg.

Biographical information

Bishop-nominee Ihor Rantsya was born on March 8, 1978, in Opilskyi, Sheptytsky District, Lviv Region. After graduating from school, he studied at Ivan Franko University in Lviv, where he earned a doctorate in geography and lectured. In 2008, he entered the Lviv Theological Seminary, obtaining a master’s degree in theology from the Ukrainian Catholic University. From 2014 to 2025, he continued his studies at the Catholic Institute in Paris, where he obtained a licentiate in ecumenical theology, and this year he completed his doctoral studies.

On March 29, 2015, he was ordained a priest in Paris for the Lviv Archeparchy of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, and later assigned to the Eparchy of St. Volodymyr the Great in Paris: from 2016 to 2019, he served as a rector of All Saints Parish in Vincennes; as parish vicar at the Cathedral in Paris (2017–2019); and as parish administrator of the cathedral (2019–2022); he headed the eparchial commission for ecumenical and interreligious relations. Since 2019, he has been the representative on the Pastoral Council of the Patriarchal Curia of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, and since March 21, 2022, he has served as protosyncellus of the eparchy.