Ukraine: Priests and religious stay to care for people

Parishioners at Pauline church shelter in Kiev

Source: ACN/Carmelites/CathPhilly/Fides

While thousands of people are on the move in the Ukraine, fleeing the arrival of Russian tanks and missiles, many priests and religious are staying to look after those unable to leave.

The Don Orione missionaries in Lviv have turned their monastery into a reception centre for for refugees and the disabled, Fides has reported.

Don Moreno Cattelan, an Orionine missionary said: "We have all gathered in the monastery of Lviv which we have decided to make available to refugees and those in need. Our other priority is the protection of the eight disabled children who live in our community." If the situation becomes more dangerous, he said they would try to take the children to to their homes in Poland or Italy.

He said: "We are all waiting. We will not be able to leave the country because there is a call to military service for all Ukrainian citizens from 18 to 60 years of age... I ask you above all to pray for us. We will not leave the Ukrainian people. We will remain here."

The Carmelite Sisters of Kharkov and Kiev, and the Carmelite Brothers of Kiev and Berdychiv have also decided decided to stay and care for the people in their community.

The Basilian Sisters, whose monastery of SS Peter and Paul in Zaporizhzhia, is located about 200 kilometres from Donetsk in eastern Ukraine are also looking after refugees. "We understand that this is our new mission, to welcome the refugee," Basilian Sister Lucia Murashko, told CatholicPhilly in a phone call. By yesterday the sisters had welcomed two families, including one woman who is eight months pregnant and advised by her doctor not to travel.

One said: "We feel peace here. We do not want to move from here; we want to help people and stay with them as long and as much as we can."

A recent pilgrimage of men and women religious, which ended in eastern Ukraine just hours ahead of the invasion, has provided renewed spiritual energy for the days ahead, one sister said.

"We were walking on the main street (of the town) and the people were crossing themselves … and making bows to the crucifix," she said. "They came to us and gave us strength to serve and … to continue our mission here, so we cannot want to go anywhere else."

From Kiev's Bowary suburb, Pauline priest Father Roman Laba reported that at 5am yesterday seven people died and 17 were wounded in a rocket attack, one of seven reported in the capital.

He said: "The first panic is over now - many people came to the parish looking for help and shelter and so we have set up emergency accommodation in the basement of our monastery and the unfinished monastery church. At the moment, we have around 80 people with us."

From a village near the south-east port of Mariupol, 37 miles from the Russian border, Brother Vasyl told Aid to the Church in Need: "Some people have come to us to make their confession for the first time in their life. Older and sick people are asking us to go to them and hear their confession. They want to be ready for death if it should come to that. We don't have time to be frightened. We are staying and helping the people to survive the situation."

Describing his work, evacuating children from destitute families to countryside in central Ukraine, Brother Vasyl said: "The children are all traumatised because there has been shooting in the area here. We calm them down and say that they need a break."

Aid to the Church in Need has given €1 million for an emergency aid programme which will meet the essential needs in four Greek-Catholic exarchates and two Roman-Catholic dioceses covering the eastern regions of Zaporizhya, Donetsk, Odesa and Krym. In the Kharkiv diocese, the aid will provide heating, lighting, water and food for 57 priests and 54 members of religious communities.

ACN's Ukraine projects manager Magda Kaczmarek reported that the country's leading bishops have appealed to people not to flee the country. She said: "Not leaving the country is a difficult decision, above all for priests of the Greek-Catholic Church, many of whom are married. "They are afraid not so much for their lives as for the safety of their children and families."