“What the Russians are doing in Mariupol cries out to heaven and calls out to God for vengeance. They shot at boilers, power transformers, they bombed the places where they pump water. They hit these places to harm people,”  a Pauline priest denounces. 

Newsroom (12/03/2022 11:25, Gaudium Press) Arch. Major Sviatoslav Shevchuk, head of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church, laments the “massacre that the population of Mariupol, the city of Mary, is suffering, and which is now turned into a cemetery for tens of thousands of people. We see horrific images of the bombing of a maternity hospital and we also see mass graves, containing hundreds of lifeless bodies.”

“The city of Mariupol has about 400,000 inhabitants and has been completely surrounded for almost two weeks. People are starving, people are freezing to death; missiles, grenades and bombs are falling on their heads,” the archbishop stressed.

Testimony of a Pauline priest

“I am deeply convinced that our evacuation from Mariupol was a miracle. God is looking after us,” Fr Paweł Tkaczyk, OSPPE, stressed in an interview with Vatican Radio.

“What the Russians are doing in Mariupol cries out to heaven and calls out to God for vengeance. They shot at boilers, power transformers, they bombed the places where they pump water. They hit these places to harm people.”

“They bomb with a diabolical charge mainly because it is a Marian city and the devil is trying to destroy everything,” Fr Tkaczyk continued to Vatican Radio.

“The second reason is that in 2014 people drove the Russians out of Mariupol and now they are taking revenge for the fact that this city, which is almost entirely Russian-speaking, does not want to be under Russian rule. This means that Ruthenians feel Ukrainian.”

“The Russians are doing everything to break with Mariupol’s spirit of defence and make the people surrender. And that’s why they bombed a maternity hospital, and dropped a bomb of about one ton in the city centre.”

“Normally they destroy a city to get in there. It is known, however, that when the Russians enter, they will start purging, that is, killing everyone who is against them. That is why the city is resisting. As a matter of principle, they are trying to wipe out Mariupol, to make the city disappear from the face of the earth.”

However, Father Tkaczyk sees the fruits of the prayers of the whole world for Ukraine. “You can see how our soldiers are resisting; everything that was planned by Putin did not work out. And it is only because God acts and gives strength, because without Him nothing could be done. Our exit from Mariupol is proof of this, with a miraculous intervention of Divine Providence during the evacuation.”

When the war is over, the priest will return to Mariupol with his brothers at the first opportunity. “I believe that Mariupol will not be conquered and we will return to restore it from the rubble, both spiritually and materially,” Father Tkaczyk emphasizes.

The Pauline Fathers were the last to withdraw from Mariupol.

Compiled by Gustavo Kralj