The April edition of “Connections With Msgr. Peter” is now available to watch. The episode features a conversation with Tetiana Stawnychy, president of Caritas Ukraine, who visited CNEWA’s New York office from Kyiv on 31 March, Msgr. Peter I. Vaccari, CNEWA president, and Olivia Poust, communications officer for CNEWA and assistant editor of ONE magazine.
Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on 24 February 2022, Caritas Ukraine has supported more than 3.5 million beneficiaries, 2 million of whom received assistance in the first year. Early on, the immediate needs were primarily short-term aid and emergency assistance, but now, three years into the war, addressing the needs on the ground is a slower process.
“As that time went on, the aid that we provide[d], it need[ed] to go deeper,” said Ms. Stawnychy. “It’s no longer just this quick response — helping people on their way — but actually helping them psychologically, helping them to settle, helping them to find jobs, helping them find a place to live.”
However, this evolution does not mean that the worst of the war has passed. Ms. Stawnychy explained the war has been escalating since the end of last summer.
“If we even just look at the number of drone attacks that were happening in Ukraine for most of 2024, the first probably eight months, it was around 300 or 400 drone attacks per month,” she said.
“The number of attacks started to rise at the end of August, and they continue to rise. … The last month we had 4,000 drone attacks in a single month in Ukraine.”
Thanks to the breadth of Caritas Ukraine’s network, which is composed of local Caritas organizations based in parishes across the country, its work persists amid escalations and attacks, and includes providing lifesaving aid to front-line regions, assisting with evacuations, caring for the displaced, responding after missile and drone strikes, repairing homes damaged in the war, and providing psychosocial support, particularly for children.
One of Caritas Ukraine’s focus areas is the development of child-friendly spaces that allow for children to work through their trauma and socialize in a safe environment. Ms. Stawnychy also highlighted Caritas’s program of psychosocial support in schools, which establishes separate spaces in schools where students can learn skills to help process and move past their trauma.
“It was one of my favorite projects when I joined Caritas in 2021 because the teachers made comments that the whole atmosphere in the school had changed,” she said.
“We really see that program as a way of stabilizing both the school and the community where the school is located.”
Another priority for Caritas Ukraine is community activation, which includes development of parish social ministry, one of Caritas Ukraine’s programs receiving funding from CNEWA.
In coordination with local parishes, Caritas Ukraine encourages communities to identify social needs they would like to address on the local level. Then, they hold a microgrant competition where participants can apply for funding to get their ideas off the ground.
“It’s a really great way of bringing people together, helping them to create a community that is responding to the needs of their neighbors around them,” she said.
After the conversation with Ms. Stawnychy, Msgr. Vaccari expressed his gratitude for the work of Caritas Ukraine, stating that “the mission of CNEWA is never done in isolation.”
“The mission of CNEWA is done with other groups, often with other groups like Caritas Ukraine.”
Msgr. Vaccari provided several agency updates during the program, including his official welcome of CNEWA’s new director of development, Brian McGinley. He also shared that CNEWA cosponsored a panel at the Pontifical Oriental Institute in Rome on 31 March to launch the first volume in a new series on contemporary Eastern Catholic theology, titled “Eastern Catholic theology in Action: Essays in Liturgy, Ecclesiology and Ecumenism.”
The panel was moderated by CNEWA’s Laura Ieraci, editor of ONE.
Msgr. Vaccari encouraged Rome-based donors and friends to join CNEWA for its events on 28 and 29 April. The first event, on 28 April, will be a reception and dinner at the Kolbe Hotel to present CNEWA’s Faith & Culture Award to John Allen Jr. The second event, on 29 April, will be a reception at the Dicastery for the Eastern Churches. For more information, or to RSVP, contact Michael J. La Civita, mjl@cnewa.org, or Msgr. Vaccari, pvaccari@cnewa.org.