Canadian Cardinal Michael Czerny, interim president of the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, gives a blessing to Caritas workers during a visit to meet Ukrainian refugees arriving at the Keleti train station in Budapest, Hungary, March 8, 2022. (CNS photo/courtesy Magyar Kurír)
Pope Francis last week sent the head of the Vatican Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development Cardinal Michael Czerny and Cardinal Konrad Krajewski, papal almoner, to Ukraine to meet with refugees and displaced persons and those who assist them. Cardinal Czerny wrote about his mission in the Jesuit publication “Aggiornamenti Sociali.” Here are excerpts.
By Cardinal Michael Czerny
Mine is a journey of prayer, prophecy and denunciation. …
I go to see directly what the situation is, and I hope to be able to bring some material help, but I go above all to meet people, to be with them. This is the prophecy of a presence and a closeness that may appear weak, even insignificant according to the logic of the world and the force of arms. However, this is not the case; being close to his people, to his children who suffer, is the way that God has chosen to enter into the history of the world, even at the cost of ending up on the cross. …
For this reason I am sure that mine will be a journey of prayer … above all the prayer of the people we will meet, a prayer that — as the book of Sirach teaches — “pierces the clouds,” because God “hears the grievance of the oppressed. He does not forsake the cry of the orphan, nor the widow when she pours out her complaint.” These people share the gift of their closeness to God with those who meet them, with those who are willing to live the sacrament of their presence, bringing the word of the Gospel and concrete support. The gesture of charity of those who welcome them becomes an opportunity to corroborate the faith that unites us and nourish the common hope that a world without war is possible, that violence and death do not have the last word. This is the mystery of Easter for which we are preparing this Lent.
For this reason, I will meet and bring the closeness of the pope and the church also to the people engaged, in so many different ways, in actions of welcome: a silent and unarmed army, committed to rebuilding that humanity which weapons try to destroy. Their hands are the hands of the whole Christian people, indeed the very hands of God.
Faith is not absent from the tragedy Ukraine is experiencing, because it is in the hearts of the people fleeing the war: most of them are believers, as are many who welcome them, and it is important that all those who wish to receive religious assistance should be able to do so, while respecting the differences between the various confessions and religions. In my journey I will also strive for this.
Finally, mine will also be a journey of denunciation. The story of the Ukrainian refugees is well known, unfolding according to the dramatic script of too many conflicts that bloody our world, often forgotten. With the same rapidity with which in a few days millions of people have had to abandon their homes, news is already coming in that the machine of human trafficking and smuggling of migrants has been set in motion at the borders and in the countries of first reception. To the drama of war and displacement is added that of slavery. In the mission that our small delegation will carry out, we will pay great attention to this issue, as well as to another equally painful point: the marginalization and sometimes rejection suffered by Africans and Asians who lived in Ukraine and are now fleeing together with the rest of the population. This is a difficult issue to address at such a tense time, yet extremely urgent. We are all children of one Father and brotherhood knows no borders: this is the meaning of the embrace of the pope and of the church that I bring to all those I will meet.
