One week ago, in the storied ballroom of The Pierre in New York City, the Franciscan Friars of the Atonement honored Catholic Near East Welfare Association with The Graymoor Sharing Hope Award at the friars’ annual Sharing Hope Celebration Dinner. Hundreds of guests packed the room as the Very Rev. Brian F. Terry, S.A., minister general, cited CNEWA’s “outstanding and steadfast work in serving our Lord by helping suffering people throughout the Middle East, Northeast Africa, India and Eastern Europe. …
“CNEWA provides an inspiration of hope echoing the friars’ charism ‘to unite what has fallen apart, and to bring home those who have lost their way.’ ”
After thanking the minister general for his thoughtful and generous gesture, CNEWA’s president, Msgr. John Kozar, reminded the guests that the friars and CNEWA “share the same DNA, as we together carry forward the legacy of Father Paul [Wattson], who shared in the founding of CNEWA some 90 years ago.”
It was a fitting occasion for the friars and the CNEWA family, as members of the church gathered together to honor the legacy of the servant of God, Father Paul of Graymoor, who was among the first to respond to help the sufferings of Christians in the Middle East in the early 20th century.