UPDATE FROM PRZEMYŚL, POLAND #2
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Dear Friends,
Continuing in our gratitude for your much needed support, we would like to share with you some fresh information.
The news of the day is that Cardinal Timothy Dolan has just traveled to our corner of the world, including Przemyśl. We were honored to have him visit one of our new locations. We had renovated a building near the Seminary in Przemyśl and we turned it into a little reception center where we plan to have 40 places for the Ukrainian refugees; we already have 8 places for our volunteers there. Cardinal Dolan was accompanied by some distinguished guests, such as Archbishop Adam Szal, Metropolitan of Przemyśl, and Archbishop senior Józef Michalik; Archbishop Mieczysław Mokrzycki, Metropolitan of Lviv; Monsignor Peter Vaccari, President of Catholic Near East Welfare Association. Below a photo taken during that visit.
We are hoping to cooperate soon with an association from Warsaw, Poland. They have taken care of about 100 refugees since the beginning of the war. Fr. Marek spoke with their leader and was asked to share what we’ve learned welcoming refugees at our centers.
This week, Fr. Marek also provided individual help to one Ukrainian family who wanted to go to Germany. They spent 2 nights at our new reception center in Przemyśl, and then Father drove them to the train station.
Last Saturday we received word from the Jarosław Abbey which has become another place of welcome in cooperation with us. Fr. Marek Pieńkowski, the Director of the Center of Culture and Christian Formation in Jarosław, told us that good people from America, England and Scotland baked 300 large pizzas in the gardens of the Abbey. The weather was great and both our Ukrainian guests and our Polish benefactors were present in great numbers. Also, our Przemyśl volunteers took the occasion to distribute backpacks for kids as well as special pictogram sets which facilitate communication in the two languages. The event is already scheduled to be repeated on June 1, when Children’s Day is celebrated in Poland.
