The head of the Pope’s charitable outreach, Cardinal Konrad Krajewski, reports a new wave of solidarity with 300,000 euros raised making it possible to buy more thermal shirts and generators to be sent to areas needing it most in Ukraine. The network of goodwill continues in reaching out to those suffering.
By Alessandro De Carolis
The solidarity hub is the parish space of Rome’s Santa Sofia church for Greek Catholics in Rome. Since Saturday morning, some twenty men, as well as seminarians and other Ukrainian volunteers primarily have begun packing the aid truck using all space available. The large truck from Slovakia left on Saturday heading for the Zaporizhzhia area, one of the epicenters of the war in Ukraine, hit for months by Russian bombardments.
Two-day journey
Cardinal Konrad Krajewski shared news of this latest initiative. Also, in the days leading up to Christmas, he got behind the wheel of a van once again to bring some forty electric generators and a large number of the thermal shirts procured through a collection by the Dicastery for the Service of Charity via a solidarity platform. And the offering of donations has continued with the more than 300,000 euros collected, allowing for more purchases and shipments of generators and thermal shirts for Ukraine. In two days, all the new equipment will be delivered and made available to the large numbers of people trying to survive inhumane living conditions, a situation made worse by the polar temperatures there now.
Ukrainian volunteers load the aid truck heading to Ukraine
Solidarity among compatriots
Cardinal Krajewski told Vatican News that, “it’s a network of goodness with people helping their compatriots, wanting to help those who are suffering.” On 19 December the Cardinal visited Lviv arriving in a large van, “the biggest I could drive,” he said.
After distributing humanitarian aid to various parts of the capital Kyiv, he stopped to to celebrate Christmas, bringing with him the closeness and blessing of Pope Francis. It marked a wartime Christmas of frigid cold and gloom due to electricity rationing, mitigated by the glow running generators. “I would say the mission is accomplished,” Cardinal Krajewski affirmed upon his return a week later to the Vatican. In reality, it is an ongoing mission that continues to be renewed.
