POTIJ, IPATIJ. - Bishop of Volodymyr-Berest and later Metropolitan of Kiev, born in 1541 and died in Vilna in 1613. He served as a state official in Berest and, in that capacity, worked—though unsuccessfully—for the ecclesiastical union between the Byzantine-Slavic Church of Poland-Lithuania and the Holy See. Appointed Bishop of Volodymyr-Berest in 1593, he became one of the leading figures in this union. He subscribed to it in Rome on December 23, 1595, and later again in Berest on October 6, 1596. Succeeding Mikhail Rahoza as Metropolitan of Kiev with his see in Vilna, he vigorously defended the Union of Berest against significant opposition, employing numerous historical and polemical works to affirm it as the legitimate continuation of the Council of Florence (1439).
P. founded a new Catholic monastery in Vilna together with St. Josaphat Kuntsevych, its first monk; the monastery became the cradle of the Ukrainian Basilian monks. P. was a man of integrity, highly energetic, and knew how to employ all means to defend the flock entrusted to him. Before his death, he escaped an assassination attempt against him.