“Each of us must transmit to others his own experience of life with Jesus Christ. To be able to do so, we need to encounter him in our life. The population of Ukraine is suffering because it does not know Christ. And the task of the missionary is to bear witness to the meeting with Him”. With this exhortation the auxiliary bishop of the diocese of Kamyanets-Podilskyi, Jan Niemie, concluded the formative meeting of the Oblate Fathers of Mary Immaculate (OMI) held in recent days at Obukhiv, near Kiev. The meeting was attended by the Fathers and Brothers of the order’s Ukrainian Delegation, active in some twenty parishes in the country. According to the most recent statistics, 54% of Ukrainians identify themselves with no religion at all. The meeting was opened by Father Jan Sikorksi, spiritual father of the Major Seminary in Kiev. On 17 May the Oblates participated in the solemn Mass celebrated in the parish church of Rokytne on the occasion of the centenary of the birth of the Servant of God Ludwik Wrodarczyk (OMI), martyred at Okopy in 1943 for having opposed the destruction of the church by Ukrainian nationalists, and installed a cross and a commemorative plaque in his honour.
