Remain faithful to God “by following the example of the numerous testimonies of faith given in the parish during the Communist period”: that is the exhortation addressed by the Apostolic Nuncio in Ukraine, Archbishop Ivan Jurkovic, to the religious and laity gathered in the parish church of St. Anne at Bar on 26 July, for a celebration marking the church’s centenary. Present in the city of Bar for a hundred years, St. Anne is one of the few Catholic churches in the Ukraine that escaped destruction during the years of the Communist regime. The centenary was celebrated with a mass officiated by Archbishop Jurkovic, flanked by Bishops Bronislav Bernatskyy and Leon Malyy. In his homily, Archbishop Jurkovic exhorted the congregation “to remain faithful to God by following the example of the numerous testimonies of faith in the parish of St. Anne”. During the Communist regime, in fact, many parishioners were persecuted or killed for their own faith. In spite of the terrible sufferings inflicted on them, the reign of terror, famine and exile, they succeeded not only in maintaining their own faith, but also in transmitting it to their children. After so many trials and tribulations, the parish of St. Anne at Bar is now a source of many vocations to the priesthood.
