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From Chaplain Stan Jasiurkowski

Greetings from Iraq

My name is Chaplain Stan Jasiurkowski, and I’m endorsed to the Army Chaplaincy by the Polish National Catholic Church.

As you know, I spent a year with my Battalion in Taji, just north of Baghdad in 2005.

Now, I’ve been in Mosul for 5 months , the second largest city in Iraq. During this time I have seen a lot misfortune, for instance, the homeless, the sick, the poor, the helpless and the hopeless.

Many people in the US are not aware, but the average Iraqi child of 8, looks as if he is a child of 6. Nurses tell me this is due to the malnutrition. I myself, have seen children on the streets of Baghdad and Mosul during school hours selling things to help the family survive. I have seen empty school rooms, because there are not enough students or teachers. Piled garbage seemed to be on maximized on every intersection street corner. These children walk in the garbage and sewage, many times without shoes at all.

Therefore, along with my Battalion we would like to organize a humanitarian mission to one of the schools in our neighborhood. In order to do that, we need some help form our fellow Americans. I pray that my friends will open up their hearts and support this very important charity mission.

I am asking your help in turning this goal into a reality, and play a vital role in bringing comfort to the local Iraqi children in striking a victory against a cold and murderous insurgency. Given the unique nature of the conflict we are embroiled in, sending something as simple as shoes, clothes, or school supplies to local children will aid your Soldiers in this fight. I feel I must warn you that these people will probably never know who you are, or recognize the role you played, but I can assure you that little boys and girls like the one pictured in this letter will be profoundly grateful for even the smallest bit of help from you. Please take a moment to clean out a closet or visit a store and do your part for our cause. A single pair of shoes, a T-shirt, a toy, a notebook, or a pencil may not win a war, but the difference it will make to the one child who receives them just might help push us in that direction. Feel free to forward this information to any family, friend, classroom, or civic group who might have asked you how they can help a Soldier in Iraq. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me by E-mail.

Any and all donations are welcome. Please send them to:

CH (CPT) Stan Jasiurkowski
HHC, 87 CSSB
FOB East Marez
APO AE 09334

Poland - Polish - Polonia

In case you’re hungry

From Adam Marianski The author has co-authored two books on meat smoking and making sausages. He runs the web site Wedliny Domowe where you can find more information about making quality meats at home. via PG-GB (Bulgaria): The Mystery of Polish Sausage – What is Kielbasa?

Without a doubt the word Kielbasa has worldwide recognition, yet it is also often misunderstood. Kielbasa is the general Polish name for sausage. You cannot walk into a Polish store and say: please give me a pound of kielbasa. The sales lady, surrounded by 50 different kinds of kielbasa, will inevitably reply: yes, but which one? There are well over 100 types of kielbasa, and the word itself is meaningless unless followed up with the proper name: Kielbasa Rzeszowska, Kielbasa Krakowska, Kielbasa Tuchowska, Kielbasa Mysliwska, etc. It is like going into a deli and asking for some cheese. Sure, but which one: American, Provolone, Swiss, Gorgonzola, Gouda, Muenster – you have to provide some details. There is no specific sausage called kielbasa but there are many sausages that carry the word kielbasa as part of the name.

We know of only one sausage that carries the word “Polish” in its name and that is the Polish Smoked Sausage (Polska Kielbasa Wedzona). This is probably what the first immigrants brought with them to America. The problem we face here is that you can find Polish Smoked Sausage in almost every supermarket in the US, and no two are made the same way. Yet Polish Smoked Sausage as been well defined for centuries and everybody in Poland knows what goes inside. We do not intend to become judges in this matter, but instead rely on Polish Government Standards for Polish Smoked Sausage. These rules have remained unchanged for the last 60 years.

Before we anger many people who have been making Polish Smoked Sausage in their own way for years, let’s clarify something further. It’s perfectly fine to add an ingredient that you or your children like into your sausage. You still have the full right to say that you made a better sausage than the famous Polish Smoked Sausage. You may say that your grandfather who came from Poland made the best Polish sausage in the world and we honor that. Maybe he used chicken stock instead of water or maybe he added something else. What we are trying to say is that he was making his own version of the known classic or some other Polish sausage and it could have tasted better for you and your family. We do not dispute that fact. You can of course add anything you like to your sausage, but it will no longer be the original Polish Smoked Sausage (Polska Kielbasa Wedzona) or any other brand named sausage. Once you start changing ingredients, you create your own recipe and you may as well come up with your own name.

  1. For centuries Polish Smoked Sausage was made of pork, salt, pepper, garlic and marjoram (optional). Then in 1964 the Polish Government introduced a second version of the sausage that was made of 80% pork and 20% beef. All other ingredients: salt, pepper, sugar, garlic, and marjoram remain the same in both recipes. The marjoram is optional but the garlic is a must.
  2. The meat is cured before it is mixed with spices. In the US Cure #1 (sodium nitrite plus salt) is used, in Europe Peklosol (sodium nitrite plus salt) is common.
  3. The sausage is stuffed into a large hog casing: 36 – 38 mm and formed into 12″ (35 cm) links.
  4. The traditional way was to cold smoke it for 1 to 1.5 days (it had to last for long time).
  5. In most cases it is hot smoked today

A little test was performed to see how large American manufacturers make Polish Sausage. Four sausages called Polish Kielbasa or Polish Sausage were bought at the local supermarket in Florida and each of them was produced by a large and well known meat plant. The number of ingredients and chemicals used varied from 10 to 20 and different combinations of meats were used: pork-beef-turkey, beef only, pork-beef. Except the name, none of the sausages had anything to do with the original.

It seems that for the manufacturers any sausage that is smoked (or have liquid smoke added) and stuffed into a 36 mm one foot long casing can be called Polish Smoked Sausage or Polish Kielbasa. It becomes quite clear that manufacturers put any ingredients they like inside of the casing and the name Polish Kielbasa is used just for credibility and to gain the trust of the consumer.

The problem is further magnified by various sites on the Internet that provide countless recipes for making Polish sausages. Yet the mysterious Polish Smoked Sausage is embarrassingly simple to make and all it needs is pork, salt, pepper and garlic.

Poland - Polish - Polonia

Been buying those Polish products?

From Fibre2Fashion: USA now stands as Poland’s most important trading partner

The challenges and opportunities facing companies exporting to America, was the theme for the conference that took place at 11 am, on Thursday the 27th September, in the Polish Information and Foreign Investment Agency (PAIiIZ) Press Centre in Warsaw.

The dynamic growth in the inflow of American investments to Poland means that the USA now stands as Poland’s most important trading partner. During the first seven months of 2007, the value of Poland’s exports to the USA has exceeded 1.1 billion USD, while American imports into Poland have reached 1.8 billion USD.

In USA trading contacts from the beginning of last year, the largest areas of growth have been in the export of arms, ammunition and in works of art. Increases in turnover have also been noted in the export of goods based on vegetable products, of food articles, chemical products and in plastics…

It’s too bad that arms has to play such a large role. Polish fibre products, food, and industrial products, glassware, etc. are top notch. Check your retail shelves and look for these lovely items.

Note that the article may only be speaking of trade in fibre goods.

Dorota Dabrowski, Executive Director of the American Chamber of Commerce in Poland responds that the US makes up only 2% of Poland’s trade. Germany is the biggest trading partner at about 45% of the total and the EU in general at over 80%. US companies as investors are big, but again only 15-17%. The bulk of investors again come from the EU.

Poland - Polish - Polonia,

Katyn Remembered

A few weeks ago the acclaimed Polish director, Andrzej Wajda released his new film about the Kayn Massacre.

On the heels of the release, Ewa Thompson, the editor of Sarmatian Review, wrote an article for the Washington Times on Katyn entitled Somber anniversaries, chances to reconcile

Notwithstanding that a Memorial to the Victims of Communism was unveiled in Washington, DC, in June 2007, the Gulag is fast slipping into oblivion. The Russians have destroyed all but one of the Gulag Archipelago camps, of which there had been hundreds, including the most barbarous ones in Kolyma and Solovki.

The only camp that still stands in all its infamous glory is located in the Urals. It survived almost by accident. In the 1990s, when the momentum of perestroika was still on, a museum commemorating the victims was built on camp grounds. In Vladimir Putin’s Russia, it seemed awkward to destroy the camp that included a museum; and thus the Perm labor camp No. 35 remained a lonely monument to communism’s way of dealing with dissent. But who goes to see Perm? Who knows about Perm except a few academic specialists?

The forest of Katyn in western Russia resonates better with world memory than Perm, though it devoured fewer victims: “only” 20,000 Polish officers, all prisoners of war, brought there surreptitiously at night, truckload after truckload, and shot in the back of the head as they were marched toward the carefully hidden ditches that became their graves.

Katyn was one of three places where these murders took place. It gained notoriety owing to one of history’s bitter ironies. The Katyn graves were discovered by the Germans in 1942, during their occupation of western portions of Soviet Russia. The Germans, ever eager to score propaganda points, waited to announce the discovery until April 1943, when the “liquidation” of the Warsaw Ghetto was to begin and the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising broke out. At that point, the Germans brought to the Katyn mass graves the International Red Cross and the world press. Many pictures were taken and published worldwide. The Nazis hoped to divert the world’s attention from what they were about to do in Warsaw.

Amid all this stood the Poles, whose country had to endure Nazi death camps in the west, and the Soviet Gulag in the east. Katyn was just an episode in this grim competition of atrocities.

It was an episode, but it has remained an indelible part of Polish memory. On Sept. 17, or the 68th anniversary of the Soviet invasion of Poland, Polish President Lech Kaczynski visited Katyn with pomp and ceremony. For the first time, the Russian government agreed to such a public manifestation of grief by the Polish head of state accompanied by many descendants of the victims.

Coincidentally, the Oscar-winning Polish film director Andrzej Wajda made a film about Katyn. The film premiered the same day, Sept. 17, in Warsaw’s Grand Theater. Mr. Wajda’s father was among the officers shot by the Soviets in 1940. Mr. Wajda dedicated his film to his father and his mother, who for years hoped against hope her husband would return from Soviet captivity. The final scene of the movie lasts 20 minutes, and it depicts the laborious process of killing the Polish captives.

There is a positive lesson in all this. At the Katyn cemetery, President Kaczynski made an appeal for Polish-Russian reconciliation. From his speech, it became apparent he did not go to Katyn to complain but to reconcile. Much bad blood exists between Poles and Russians, and it will take patience, forgiveness and wisdom to lay the past to rest. Mr. Kaczynski made the first step…

Poland - Polish - Polonia,

Stuart Dybek Receives MacArthur Grant

I’m catching up with some older news. Here one from the Chronicle of Higher Education: 8 Professors Are Among 24 New MacArthur Fellows

The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation named eight professors today among the 24 MacArthur Fellows for 2007.

The fellowships, or “genius awards,” as they are commonly called, recognize people in a variety of fields for their creativity and promise. Each new fellow receives an award of $500,000, which is meant to encourage future exploration and comes with no strings attached.

Among the academic winners for 2007 are a medieval historian, biologists who study bees and spider silk, and several other professors working in the sciences.

The MacArthur Foundation does not accept applications for the awards. Instead, it invites approximately 100 professionals from nearly every academic discipline to submit anonymous nominations to the foundation’s 12-person selection committee. The committee, whose members also serve anonymously, reviews all nominations and then forwards its recommendations to the foundation’s Board of Directors for approval. Winners are then notified via telephone.

This year’s class of 24 brings the total number of MacArthur Fellows since the program began, in 1981, to 756.

…

Stuart Dybek, writer in residence at Northwestern University. His short stories pay tribute to the literature and iconography of the Old World while exploring the imaginations of contemporary American communities.

Here is Mr. Dybek’s profile from Western Michigan University where he is a professor of English.

Perspective, , ,

Global South

A friend and occasional correspondent referred the following article to me and asked that I include it in my blog.

From the National Catholic Reporter: Global South underrepresented in college of cardinals

In naming 23 new cardinals on Wednesday, Pope Benedict XVI chose to acknowledge one bit of demographic reality, but largely ignored a much bigger one.

Americans have noted, and rightly so, that the nomination of Archbishop Daniel DiNardo in Houston accurately reflects a shift in Catholic population in the United States away from the East Coast, towards the South and Southwest. From a global point of view, however, the new crop of cardinals is remarkably unrepresentative of where Catholics are today.

To understand that, it’s essential to recall that Catholicism experienced a demographic revolution in the 20th century. In 1900, there were 266 million Catholics in the world, 200 million of whom lived in Europe and North America. Just a century later, there were 1.1 billion Catholics, only 380 million of whom were in Europe and North America, with 720 million in Latin America, Africa and Asia. The global South accounted for 25 percent of the Catholic population a century ago; today it’s 67 percent and climbing.

You wouldn’t know that, however, from looking at Benedict’s appointments. Focusing just on the 18 new cardinal-electors, meaning those under 80 with the right to vote for the next pope, ten are Europeans and two are from the United States. (Three of the five over-80 cardinals named by Benedict XVI are likewise Europeans. Had Bishop Ignacy Ludwik Jez of Poland lived to receive the honor, it would have been four of six.) After these new cardinals join the church’s most exclusive club in a Nov. 24 consistory, 60 of 121 electors will be European. Adding the cardinals from the United States and Canada, the total for the global North rises to 76 electors out of 121, meaning 63 percent.

To put this into a sound bite, two-thirds of the cardinals come from the global North, while two-thirds of the Catholic people live in the South.

Such disparities do not go unnoticed. The pope’s announcement was made at roughly 11:30 a.m. Rome time, and within a half-hour I had an e-mail from La Tercera, a newspaper in Santiago, Chile, asking for a reaction to the following question: “Two-thirds of the nominees are from Western Europe or the U.S. Why?”

Why indeed? At least three reasons suggest themselves…

This didn’t jump out at me, so thanks for the referral.

I think that the author covered the issues well, and that this was an interesting analysis.

This does bring up an interesting aside in relation to the current crisis in the Anglican Communion.

As we know, the global South is leading the charge for a traditional understanding of Christianity within the Anglican CommunionMy understanding is that global South Anglicans tend to be more Evangelical in their Churchmanship and that their “traditional” understanding of Christianity does not preclude women as clerics.. I would think that that fact is not lost on the Bishop of Rome. At the same time, the South presents its own set of problems, from Liberation Theology to challenges to celibacy, problems with overdone efforts at inculturation, and occasional failings in confronting and opposing evil.

I would wonder how many of those lessons and issues played into the mix of choices.

For more on issues confronting the Roman Catholic Church in Africa check out Christianity in Africa South of the Sahara, Roman Catholic Christianity, The Church in Africa since Vatican II from African Christianity, A History of the Christian Church in Africa.

Perspective, Political,

They’re not speaking for us

…but he is:

The complex of considerations weighed heavily on Rabbi Howard L. Jaffe of Temple Isaiah, who after weeks of thought decided to back the genocide resolution. —It’s very hard for me to support a position that could be detrimental to Israel,— he said. —But for me as a Jew, I have to take seriously Jewish values, and they require us to do what is right and righteous.—

From the NY Times in Armenian Issue Presents a Dilemma for U.S. Jews

The article discusses the conflicts that have arisen between various Jewish communities in Massachusetts and a couple of national Jewish organizations that are advocating against recognition of the Armenian genocide.

The problem with organizations like the ADL, AJC, and AIPAC is that they claim to represent the interests of all people of a certain ethnic group. That’s not bad in and of itself. The fight for respect is a worthy fightHeaven knows that the Polish American Congress has long rallied against anti-Polish defamation and the mis-characterization of Poles, Polish-Americans, and Poland, especially in the MSM.

That being said, such organizations are often self-perpetuating institutions, supported by a small percentage of the community, and held to the fore by those who make a living off that support. Unfortunately, that’s a recipe for loosing sight of the people’s needs as well as their voice.

In the Massachusetts case, the people took back their voice. True freedom of expression recognized.

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