[Photo unavailable]
The new cathedral at Novosibirsk was under roof already in October
and was used for the closing Mass of the first pastoral conference
of the apostolic administration. The mansard-style building at its
right is the new diocesan curia, also under construction. There
has been no word yet as to when the cathedral will be dedicated.
After many months in the planning, we can now announce that all three of the apostolic administrators leading the rebuilding of the Catholic Church in Russia and the five Central Asian republics are coming to Colorado Springs, CO, during the second week of June to participate in the National Conference to Assist the Catholic Church in Russia, Siberia, and Central Asia.
The conference - planned by a committee of parishioners of St. Thomas More parish in the archdiocese of Denver led by their pastor, Fr. Michael Walsh, and various consultants from across the country - was recently endorsed by Bishop Richard C. Hanifen of Colorado Springs and will be held at Holy Apostles Church in his see city, a church seating over 2,000.
The consultants include Father Al Bitz of the Fargo ND diocese, Msgr. George Sarauskas from the U.S. bishops' office to aid the Catholic Church in Central and Eastern Europe, Capuchin Fathers John Lager and Blaine Burkey, and Holy Apostle Church's pastor, Father Paul Wicker. Parishioners of Holy Apostle's Church will now join the steering committee.
Archbishop Theodore E. McCarrick of Newark, NJ, chairman of the U.S. bishops' ad hoc committee to aid the Catholic Church in Central and Eastern Europe, commended the committee "for taking on such an ambitious project to raise the awareness of Catholics in our country about the conditions of the Church in Eastern Europe. The needs of the Catholic Church in the former Soviet Union are enormous. They rely on their brothers and sisters in the West to help them overcome the disastrous legacy of communism."
Archbishop Tadeusz Kondrusiewicz of Moscow, Bishop Joseph Werth, S.J., of Novosibirsk, and Bishop Jan Pavel Lenga of Karaganda, Kazakhstan, have agreed to come to the United States in order to help educate interested people from around the country on the needs of the Church in the former Soviet Union, to share their own priorities and hopes for filling these needs, and to explain in practical terms how people can best help them.
Various Americans who have already been helping the Church in the former Soviet Union will also share their experiences and know-how. Among possibilities being presented will be the program of the bishops' office for twinning U.S. and Russian parishes.
Precise times and registration information will appear in this newsletter as soon as they are available, but a pre-registration sign-up for further information should be requested from the Conference Committee, St. Thomas More Parish, 8035 South Quebec Street, Englewood Colorado 80112 (303) 770-3240.
Hopefully many readers of this newsletter will have a chance to meet one another and the Russian bishops and further network in Colorado Springs.
Warsaw, Poland (CNS) - Most of the estimated 350,000 Catholics living in Siberia have a strong faith, but also believe their church would benefit from adopting Orthodox practices, according to the first opinion survey carried out by the Catholic Church among the region's far-flung parishes.
The respondents also believe that Catholics have advantages in being more independent from state control, and should be self-confident and assertive in contacts with non-Catholics, the poll indicates.
Nearly half those surveyed said they had become Catholics within the past three years. One in six said they had been raised in the church since birth.
The poll results, published in Poland's Slowo Dziennik Katolicki daily, also suggested Siberian Catholics are generally well-educated and can provide clear explanations of their reasons for choosing Catholicism.
The survey, conducted by organizers of the recent Siberian pastoral congress [ reported in Issue No. 13 of a letter from SIBERIA ] received answers from priests, religious and lay people in various parts of the 8 million-square-mile territory.
Most said the Catholic Church is more universal than its Orthodox counterpart and has a more comprehensible liturgy.
But, while 60 percent rejected suggestions that Russian Catholics should begin using the Orthodox liturgical calendar, the majority also said Catholics should adopt certain Orthodox rituals such as lighting candles for the dead.
They also said lent and other Christian festivals should be observed more strictly, and that sermons should contain more references to the saints and church fathers...
Most respondents to the survey said they want an end to "mutual accusations" between the Catholic and Orthodox Churches and also favored closer cooperation between the churches.
They also said Russian Catholics should avoid becoming isolated in their smaller communities and should show greater trust toward members of other confessions.
Asked what it is about their own church that makes them proud, the most common answers were its "openness to others, readiness for dialogue" and "efforts at ecumenism."
Others cited the apostolic succession of bishops, the "serious attitude" toward sacramental life, and the readiness of priests to extend pastoral care to all people, regardless of belief or religious affiliation.
Most Catholics said they welcome the fact that the church's Russian-language liturgy is easy to understand. They also said they believe priests should show a "missionary interest" in Russians who have no formal church attachment, but who are searching for the Christian faith.
The survey appears to confirm earlier claims that recent interchurch disputes have had little effect on ordinary Catholic and Orthodox Christians.
The results also demonstrate that, as in European Russia, most recent Catholic converts come from the intellegentsia and maintain a high degree of personal discipline and awareness in their approach to the Christian faith...
Last of a series of five excerpts from an account of a visit with
Bp. Joseph Werth in Novosibirsk in January and February of
1994. Father Bitz can be reached at 302 1st Ave. P.O. Box 9, Wimbledon ND
58492 or INTERNET:
bitz@acc.jc.edu or (701) 435-2310.
0n the way home to Novosibirsk, we stopped at the Academic City, which has a Super Value grocery store. It is just like a store in America. It was started by a young, Russian-speaking entrepreneur from Minneapolis. Prices are the same as in the American stores. However, this means the prices are high for the average Russian who makes only $50 - $100 a month.
Generally, there seems to be a lot of gloom, doom, and despair in Siberia. Since the change to privatization, the mafia really has taken over. They control about 80% of all the businesses. This means they extort between 10 and 20% from anyone who runs any kind of business. They often send 10 year old children to collect the "mafia fees." If they don't pay up - even the smallest vendors on the streets - they somehow will suffer mafia consequences. Many people have lost their jobs or if they have jobs, they have not been paid in two or three months. There is food on the shelves, but it is very expensive. Inflation is running almost 20% a month. Crime is very high. It is a very difficult situation for all people. The cost of trying to make a change to democracy and a market economy is very high for most people. They wonder if they will make it. I asked one young man what he thinks will happen. He replied, "I think we will end up with another dictator. They want someone who is strong, someone who can bring order out of chaos, someone who can control the mafia. "As Bp. Werth says, "We don't know from one day to the next what will happen. Anything can happen at any time."
Pope John Paul II has donated $10,000 towards the construction of the new Russian Orthodox Cathedral of the Resurrection in Simbirsk (once Ul'yanovsk), the Volga River hometown of Vladimir Lenin. It is believed to be the first donation ever made by a pope toward construction of an Orthodox place of worship.
Archbishop John Bukovsky, SVD, a naturalized American born in the Czech Republic, has replaced Archbishop Francesco Colasuonno as papal nuncio to the Russian Federation.
Crux of the News (Jan. 16) reports there are now 54 priests in European Russia ministering to 63 parishes with 300,000 members.
St. Agnes Sisters Lucy Ann Wasinger, Mary Elise Leiker and Mary Ann Schippers will be in the States during the end of February and most of March, renewing their visas and visiting relatives, friends and other benefactors. Readers in the Kansas area should mark the calendar now for the Feb. 25 reception for the Sisters at Kennedy Middle School, Hays, at 2:30 p.m.
Anyone interested in the work of the Church in Siberia will surely want to find and read "On the Road in Siberia" by Bruce Hyman, S.J., which appeared in America magazine for Dec. 31, 1994, pp. 18-20. It has much on Jesuit Fathers Alexander "Sasha" Kahn, Joseph Messmer and Michael Desjardins.
The HTML version of this issue is posted at
http://feefhs.org/lfs/lfs-14.html
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