Currents News Staff
Cardinal Timothy Dolan is on a mission to help the people of Ukraine. The archbishop of New York is in Italy now, but on April 29, he’s headed to the Ukrainian border to meet with refugees and he may even cross the border into the war-torn country.
“Hey, buongiorno, good morning,” the cardinal said. “Cardinal Timothy Dolan coming to you from Rome, not New York, thanks for tuning in.”
Calling it the ‘antipasto’ of his overseas trip, New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan has been tweeting videos from the Vatican. The cardinal met with Pope Francis on Thursday. On Friday, he’s heading to Poland to meet with Ukrainian refugees at parishes, a railroad station and the border.
“I’m here on my way to those countries bordering Ukraine that have so generously taken over 4 million refugees from the suffering,” Cardinal Dolan said, “the anguish of that beloved Ukraine.”
Refugees like Iryna and her sons who came to Poland from Lviv to escape the war.
“I can’t say this without tears from my eyes because it’s just,” Iryna said, “I couldn’t imagine, you know, that it would be happening. It is just awful.”
In an interview with Vatican News, Cardinal Dolan, Chair of the Catholic Near East Welfare Association, says he wants to bring over the gifts that Catholics have donated.
After Poland, his eminence will travel to Ukraine’s borders with Slovakia, Hungary and may even cross the border into Ukraine, he says, if they can do that.
“This is a moral issue of oppression of vulnerable people,” Cardinal Dolan said. “This is a moral issue of an abuse of power… is a moral issue of unprovoked and illicit use of violence and military force.”
Cardinal Dolan says he’s afraid that the war will expand into other countries and that there is raw evil in the world.