window of the
Moscow Cathedral Bukovsky was born in
Cerová, Czechoslovakia, on 18 January 1924, the fourth of six children. He entered the Society of the Divine Word seminary in
Nitra, Czechoslovakia, in 1939. The Society sent him to the United States for additional studies in 1947. Ordered to return to Czechoslovakia when the new Communist government revoked his passport, he instead with the help of Chicago Mayor
Richard J. Daley reentered the U.S. from Canada as a legal immigrant. He was ordained in December 1950 in
Techny, Illinois, as a priest of the
Divine Word Missionaries and became a U.S. citizen a few years later. In 1952 he received a degree in sacred theology from Catholic University. He then pursued an academic career, teaching at St. Mary's Seminary in Techny for 14 years and studying at the University of Chicago's Oriental Institute and earning a degree from the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Rome in 1966. He was the first Nuncio to Romania of the post-Communist era. On 20 December 1994, he was appointed the first papal representative to the Russian Federation. Bukovsky had some significant successes there, regaining partial control of the former seminary in
St. Petersburg. Bukovsky retired upon the appointment of his successor,
Giorgio Zur on 29 January 2000. Pope John Paul named him a member of the
Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity and a consultor to the Secretariat of State on 6 June 2002. He died in
Techny, Illinois, on 18 December 2010. == Writings ==