Aleksander Zienkiewicz (1910 - 1995)
Aleksander Zienkiewicz was born in the village of Lembówka in the Vilnius region, into a deeply religious family of Jadwiga née Wróblewska and Kazimierz Zienkiewicz, as the oldest of twelve siblings. After graduating from primary school, he entered the Minor Seminary in Nowogródek, which soon changed its name to Bishop's Junior High School for Men and was moved to Drohiczyn. Then he studied (1931-1938) at the Major Seminary of Saint Thomas Aquinas in Pińsk. He was ordained a priest by the Ordinary of Pińsk, Bishop Kazimierz Bukraba (April 3, 1938). He celebrated the first Holy Mass ceremony (April 17, 1938) at the grave of St. Andrew Bobola, on the day of his canonization, in the Jesus church in Rome, where he arrived on a pilgrimage of the Pinsk diocese.
After ordination, he was chaplain to Bishop K. Bukraby, and from 1939 he served in Nowogródek as rector of the parish church and chaplain of the Sisters of Nazareth and prefect at the Junior High School Adam Mickiewicz.
The World War II (September 1, 1939) and two occupations - first Soviet, then German - are dramatic experiences in the life of Aleksander Zienkiewicz. After the Germans murdered many priests, he served not only as dean of Nowogródek (from 1942), but also as general vicar in the northern part of the Pinsk diocese; he visited the parishes of murdered priests, celebrating Holy Masses and administering the sacraments. A painful experience that influenced his entire priestly life was the murder by the Germans of 11 Sisters of Nazareth, who, as their superior, Sr. Stella, declared on the eve of the execution, offered their lives to save their chaplain and the inhabitants of Nowogródek, who were threatened with arrest. After the shooting of the 11 Martyrs (August 1, 1943), Aleksander Zienkiewicz was wanted by the Gestapo. Thanks to the help of his parishioners, he avoided arrest, although Gestapo officers were already waiting for him in front of the church where he was worshiping.
He managed to avoid arrest for several months, at first hiding in the private homes of his parishioners near Nowogródek, and then in Vilnius. In the fall of 1946, under pressure from the Soviet services, he left Nowogródek with the last transport of repatriates. Earlier, his parents and siblings said goodbye to their homeland and went to the Western Territories of Poland in the post-war borders, to the town of Wschowa.
Alexander arrived to Wrocław, where he began a fifty-year ministry in the Archdiocese of Wrocław. He worked as a school prefect in Syców, then in Wrocław at the Pedagogical Secondary School and the 1st and 3rd High School; as rector of the Minor Seminary in Zagan (1951-1952); as a prefect, lecturer, vice-rector, and finally rector (1953-1958) of the Major Seminary in Wrocław. From 1958 he served as Catholic rector Scientific Institute, and after its liquidation by the state authorities, he was the rector and lecturer of the Two-Year Post-Secondary Catechetical Studies for many years. He also held numerous functions in diocesan offices, including: censor of religious publications, member of the Commission for film, radio, television and theater, examination commission for high school catechists and chairman of the Pastoral Department of the Archbishop's Curia.
When the campaign to remove religious education from schools intensified (1950s), Aleksander was dismissed, first from the Pedagogical Secondary School and then from ZILO. However, in order to ensure that - as he recalled - "there would be a further fight for the souls of young people, for their faith and Christian ethics", he led (since 1951) catechetical meetings for numerous former students in the church of St. Joseph.
On Sundays, the participants of these catecheses came to Holy Mass at the university church, where a Jesuit from Lviv, Father Stanisław Mirek, led the Academic Pastoral Care. From 1953, these meetings, held clandestinely, moved to the church of St. Giles. Their participants, called "Idziaks", i.e. former pupils, students and those invited by the priest.
Aleksandra students explored ethical, religious and patriotic issues together. It was, as Aleksander Zienkiewicz said, "the nucleus of the second Center for Academic Pastoral Care in Wrocław", an impressive work he created, which was the pastoral care of academic youth and young intelligentsia. In 1963 he was nominated as the archdiocesan academic chaplain, head of the Central Center for Pastoral Care Akademickiego (CODA) in Wrocław at ul. Katedralna 4 ("Pod Czwórka"). It was a kind of university of religious knowledge with a rich didactic program, and at the same time a center of deep spiritual formation of students and young adepts of science. Aleksander Zienkiewicz gathered around himself a group of valuable collaborators, thanks to which the young people could spend their evenings during Holy Masses, listen to lectures on ethics, characterology, pedagogy, psychology, philosophy, dogmatic and biblical theology, canon law, and twice a year a series of conferences preparing for marriage and family life. Formation work was accompanied by days of retreat and Advent and Lent retreats. Young people could also deepen their knowledge and spiritual development during seminars: inner life, Holy Scripture, ethics, philosophy. Monthly meetings of families and meetings of graduates of teachers, doctors, lawyers, artists were held. On Sunday evenings, they gathered by the fireplace to share memories, reflections referring to patriotic anniversaries, to meet special guests, to sing songs together - patriotic, camp, religious, and also listen to the song "Polesia czar" sung by Uncle.
But a religious university is not everything, because at the heart of this work was the personal testimony of a priest of enormous knowledge, authentic piety, unprecedented humility, a very hard-working man, and at the same time open to every need of his students - both spiritual and material. Always ready to put aside something when someone urgently needed confession or spiritual advice. Similarly with material needs. He himself was modestly dressed, he didn't need anything, and he would give a poor student a jacket or shoes that he had just received for his name day.
And he did it with the greatest discretion... Sometimes we learned about his generosity only after his death. He lives in the grateful memory of several generations as an exemplary priest devoted to God and people, a wonderful confessor, a valued preacher, an educator and a confidant of young people.
He died in the reputation of holiness, solemnly farewelled by the shepherds of the Church, over two hundred priests, nuns and thousands of pupils, including those from Nowogródek. He was solemnly dismissed, although in his will he asked to be buried modestly, in a black cassock, without any praise over the coffin...
In the years 2010-2017, the beatification process for Aleksander Zienkiewicz took place in the Archdiocese of Wrocław. Extensive procedural documentation was submitted to the Vatican Congregation for the Causes of Saints, and two years later the Holy Church issued a Decree on the validity of the investigation at the diocesan level. Currently, Positio is being created - a document based on which the Holy Father, at the request of a commission of cardinals, issues the Decree on the heroic virtues of the Servant of God. In accordance with the requirements of the procedural procedure, the exhumation of the mortal remains of Aleksander Zienkiewicz, which were moved from the Cathedral Cemetery of St. Lawrence to the church of St. Peter and Paul at ul. Katedralna 4 and placed in a sarcophagus.
Let us pray for a miracle through the intercession of the Servant of God and for his quick beatification!
