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Fall-Winter Edition of the Cosmopolitan Review

The Fall-Winter edition of the Cosmopolitan Review has been published. Here’s the preview:

Poland has been commemorating anniversaries all year and those of us observing from a distance have shared in the country’s happiness. True, some of those anniversaries mark events that were far from happy, but now they are not only far in the past but also signify a remarkable endurance and resilience.

To share this joy, CR’s own Justine Jablonska put together a photo essay illustrating these significant dates with selected personalities from the arts, letters and politics of this successful country. We also invited Andrew Nagorski to say a few words, which he does with elegance and affection. And we have musicians from Wawel (top left) for a rousing chorus of Sto lat!

But as faithful readers all know, CR’s Poland is wherever there are Poles, and we hope our British friends forgive us if the sun never sets on us for a change. This issue, we write about Poles in Africa from the perspective of people who cherish the memory of their enchanted childhood, complete with an escape from the clutches of a monster. They hold regular reunions in Wrocław. A refugees’ reunion, you ask? It’s a psychological and social phenomenon Amanda Chalupa feels compelled to study.

About the same time that Polish kids frolicked with boa constrictors in Africa, Polish cabaret stars entertained Polish troops serving in the Polish II Corps under General Władysław Anders. Beth Holmgren, who has made interwar cabaret her own, introduces us to some very talented people as The Cabaret Goes to War.

Whatever has been said about the long communist era, artists find a way. Justine Jablonksa reviews Eric Bednarski’s beautiful film about dreamy neon signs created in a system that never delivered the goods that were advertised. A bit surreal? Tune in to the conversation.

Still with films, Małgorzata Dzieduszycka casts a sensitive eye on Jan Komasa’s MIASTO 44 and on Warsaw Uprising. There will never be a last word on this event, nor could it be otherwise.

Ben Paloff muses on the poet laureate of the wartime generation, Krzysztof Baczyński. Is he, as Magda Romańska suggested, “Bob Dylan, William Shakespeare, Pablo Neruda and James Dean rolled into one,” or is he more like Keats, or maybe Marcel Proust?

We move on to the 2nd largest Polish city in the world, Chicago, specifically Stuart Dybek’s Chicago. Agnieszka Tworek explores this gifted writer’s perceptive and sympathetic stories about the gritty immigrant neighborhood of Chicago, and has a few questions for the award-winning author as well.

We are pleased to have another review by the young Toronto-based historian, Michał Kasprzak, whose great writing could upstage the authors under discussion. But with consummate skill, he instead seduces people to read – and maybe even buy! – the book. In this case it is the new history of modern Poland by Brian Porter-Szücs who examined Poland and came up with a startling diagnosis: Poles are normal people, just like everybody else. Some of us have long suspected as much but were waiting for a professional confirmation. Kasprzak will fill you in.

And we end with a fitting finale. Pomp, history, great plans and good feelings fill Martin Grzadka’s account of Canada’s first state visit to Poland. Yes, much business was discussed but the warm bilateral relations were the icing on the cake for a young professional proud to be a citizen of both countries.

Before we go, we invite you to look at our About Us page, where we introduce our stellar cast of Contributing Editors. We look forward to an exciting 2015.

Christian Witness, ,

A Prayer for Veteran’s Day

praythankrememberveteransday01

We thank Thee, Lord, for America, our home. We bless Thee for the liberty, the opportunity, and the abundance we share. But above all we praise Thee for the traditions which have made our country great, and for the patriots who have laid the foundations through faith, courage, and self-sacrifice. Teach us in our own day the meaning of citizenship, and help us to be faithful stewards of the responsibility which Thou entrusted to us. Through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. — A Prayer for our Country from A Book of Devotions and Prayers According to the Use of the Polish National Catholic Church

Homilies, , , ,

Reflection for the 21st Sunday in Ordinary Time 2014

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A life full of
riches.

Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How inscrutable are his judgments and how unsearchable his ways! … For from him and through him and for him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.

God’s judgments testify to His righteousness, as well as to His wisdom. God knows how to catch those who oppose him in their own snares by allowing them to fall, not by His doing, but by their own free will and choices that oppose Him. In contrast with His judgments, His ways are the way of grace that lead to eternal life for those who chose Him. How wonderful and wise are His judgments and ways! They make us rich.

Looking back at history and even our lives we can truly marvel at His wisdom. Consider how He: Has mercy on the disobedient; Gathers us out of the many peoples, Jews and Gentiles, into a people who are His own; Uses us to convert others; and Preserves the world despite malice and evil until we have built His kingdom through the grace He gives us.

His wisdom is entirely immeasurable and unfathomable; His judgments and ways are inscrutable and incomprehensible. So lies the emphasis: This powerful and incomprehensible God joins Himself to humanity and sacrificed Himself all so we might be drawn up to be like Him; so that we may enter into glory after glory. So that by the freedom He allows we may chose for Him and bring others to Him.

God wants the salvation of all people, has revealed Himself to us, has shown us the way we should go, has called upon us to proclaim Him and invite others to know Him, and has left us the tremendous promise of eternal life and glory even though we lack His perfection and fall at times.

Paul confirms that the judgments and ways of God are inscrutable and untraceable with three questions, which he borrows from Isaiah and Job: For who has known the mind of the Lord or who has been his counselor? Or who has given the Lord anything that he may be repaid?

Paul reminds us that everything that is and will be has its beginning in God, is carried out by God, and serves God’s purposes. God needs nothing and we can offer Him nothing – excepting this: our faith, like Peter, our declaration that He is our God.

God asks us to come into relationship with Him and each other. He shows us the way and gives us the words that can make all our lives rich and complete.

To him be glory forever! Paul makes this great exclamation, calling on us to give glory to God for His judgments and His ways; for the riches He gives to all who by faith in Him build His kingdom and join together in His life.

Art, Events, Media, Poetry, Poland - Polish - Polonia, Political, , , , , , , , ,

Summer Issue of the Cosmopolitan Review

The summer issue of the Cosmopolitan Review has been published. The authors note:

The arts, in all their variety, are mirrors that reflect a people. We owe so much to artists. They make us laugh, cry, think, and see ourselves in our infinite variety, so no wonder we admire those talented people who create images, words and music that enrich our lives.

This issue, we focus on them, whether we find them working in films, theatre, or galleries, composing music or performing it, writing plays or acting, or writing prose or poetry. You’ll find them all represented here.

Let’s start with the movies. For that we’re grateful to Agnieszka Niezgoda and Jacek Laskus, whose marvelous book, Hollywood.pl, introduces us to some of the most talented people to ever leave Poland – not necessarily forever – and make their mark in the dream capital of the world.

Hollywood has been a talent magnet for a long time and one of the first superstars was Poland’s Pola Negri. Justine Jablonska reviews her story written by Mariusz Kotowski.

Poland’s poets… as once written in the New York Times, “if cash money were on the line…” few critics would bet against Polish poets being the best in the world. With that in mind, Agnieszka Tworek spoke to award-winning translator Joanna Trzeciak about her work – and her friendship – with two of the greats: Wisława Szymborka and Tadeusz Różewicz.

And speaking of poets, Magda Romanska introduces us to a poet and playwright who also happens to be a Nobel Prize-winning scientist, Roald Hoffman. Join them for a discussion about the arts and science, and about Polish roots.

Beth Holmgren revisits prewar Polish cabaret… and its postwar reappearance in Tel Aviv.

Meanwhile, Lara Szypszak has a few suggestions about galleries, performances and generally low cost and easily accessible culture in Warsaw. Join her.

An anthology of modern Polish plays, (A)pollonia, came to our attention via Will Harrington. The eleven plays, some performed in many countries, are set in Poland but deal with universal themes.

Łukasz Wodzyński returns to CR to share his love, and understanding, of modern Polish literature with an essay about the Introduction to Polish Literature by Jarosław Anders and a review of a new edition of Gomrowicz’s Diary, with the great writer’s thoughts on everything from the Catholic Church to Marxism, and the human condition in general.

Finally, there’s that long established and very special art form that, over time, has left us a record of some of the most interesting people in every culture: letter writing. We bring back that most colorful member of the original, 19th century Polish Society of California – not to mention a great American patriot, Rudolf Korwin Piotrowski, in a translation of previously unpublished letters found in the library of Jagiellonian University by the research/writing team, Maureen Mroczek Morris and Lynn Ludlow, who seem to travel between centuries with the greatest of ease.

And another writer whose letters transcend time and place, Krystyna Wituska, will be remembered in Germany on June 26th with a new book and a monument unveiled by the Memorial Centre in Halle Saale. A young member of the Polish underground, her words about war and peace, friendship and love, hairstyles, fashion, literature and fun, as well as life and death, were written to her parents and also – in what must be a unique prison correspondence – to the daughter of her compassionate German prison guard. Seems Wituska’s letters were written for our troubled times.

Enjoy the summer, read a lot, visit galleries and theatres, go to movies, and tip your hat to the creative people who make all this possible.

Christian Witness, Events, PNCC, , , , ,

Congratulations to Holy Trinity Parish

From the Meriden Record-Journal: Southington church turns 100

Been to the parish. Very dedicated and loving people. Congratulations on your anniversary! Dwieście lat!!!

SOUTHINGTON, CT — Marilyn Folcik and her sister Arlene Strazzulla looked at a black and white photo pinned on a corkboard inside the Holy Trinity Polish National Catholic Church on Summer Street Thursday afternoon.

Strazzulla leaned into the picture from 1957 to get a better look and then pointed to a little girl among a crowd of people standing outside the church.

“That was me and that was my sister,” she said.

Then she pointed to a man in the back.

“And that was my grandfather,” she added.

Folcik and Strazzulla’s grandfather, John Knapp, along with 16 other men, helped build the church 100 years ago. It opened its doors in July of 1914.

Rev. Joseph Krusienski, pastor of Holy Trinity Polish National Catholic Church, stands with long-time parish members Arlene Strazzulla, left, of Southington, and Marilyn Folcik, right, of Bristol, Thursday, July 24, 2014. The church, located on Summer St. in Southington, is celebrating its 100th year anniversary. | Dave Zajac / Record-Journal
Rev. Joseph Krusienski, pastor of Holy Trinity Polish National Catholic Church, stands with long-time parish members Arlene Strazzulla, left, of Southington, and Marilyn Folcik, right, of Bristol, Thursday, July 24, 2014. The church, located on Summer St. in Southington, is celebrating its 100th year anniversary. | Dave Zajac / Record-Journal
In October, the church and its parishioners will celebrate the anniversary with a Mass followed by a banquet at the Aqua Turf Club.

The first Polish National Catholic Church was formed in 1897 in Scranton, Pa. after many Polish immigrants were longing to have Mass spoken in their native language.

“It was one of the original reasons why we broke away from the Roman Catholic Church,” said Folcik who is also the chairman of the church’s Parish Committee.

“They wanted a Polish-speaking priest,” Strazzulla added.

One of the major differences is that Polish Catholic priests are encouraged to marry and have families. The Holy Trinity Polish National Catholic Church also doesn’t consider the Pope to be infallible. Some of the seven sacraments have also been modified.

Folcik said she remembered her grandfather saying he wanted Polish people to be able to become priests and bishops and wanted Mass in their native language. The desires prompted some Polish members of the Southington community to form their own church.

A short history of the church written by Folcik for the anniversary, says the foundation of the building was “dug by hand by these sixteen men and others.”

After 1958 all Masses were in English.

“Even though ‘Polish’ is in the name of the church, that’s because it’s our heritage,’” said Strazzulla. “But it’s open to all nationalities.”

In April 1944, a fire tore through the building. Strazzulla and Folcik said the cause of the fire was never determined, though many speculate it could have started from a candle left burning from a wedding ceremony earlier in the day.

After the fire, parishioners joined together to salvage the church. Many made donations.

The Rev. Joseph Krusienski, who has been with the church for 43 years, went to the front of the church Thursday to retrieve old receipts from the repair work.

“The main altar, it was $1,050 to repair,” he said pointing to the typewritten receipt.

He added that each stain-glass window had to be replaced, costing $200 apiece.

“Now they’re worth a couple thousand,” Krusienski said.

In the 1960s the church underwent renovations that included new carpeting, paint on the walls, new pews, and new altar railings. A lot of the help came from parishioners who donated money to keep the church going.

The church’s properties, which include a rectory next to the church and a cemetery on Prospect Street in Plantsville, are owned and maintained by the parish. The parish committee and pastor make decisions regarding the properties.

Strazzulla and Folcik, both born and raised in Southington and now nearing or in their 50s, reminisced on the many years they spent in the church. As the third generation, they remembered being baptized, having their communion, confirmation, and even getting married in the church. The church’s 100th year anniversary is important, they said.

“It’s a really warm feeling,” Strazzulla said.

“We’re proud,” Folcik added.

“We’re very proud and honored to carry on what our ancestors started,” Strazzulla said.

PNCC, , , , , , ,

A place to fill out their souls

From the The Lowell Sun: A welcoming family: St. Casimir’s Parish in Lowell welcomes those seeking faith to its tight-knit community

LOWELL — It may be one of Lowell’s best kept secrets, particularly for those who love traditional Polish foods like pierogi (dumplings), golabki (cabbage roll) or kapusta (braised sauerkraut or cabbage with bacon, mushroom and onion).

At a church kitchen and hall on Lakeview Avenue, volunteers who know their way around a dough pressing machine as well as the tricks to producing the perfect cabbage roll lend their talents a few times a month to their church, St. Casimir’s Polish National Catholic Church.

The team effort of these volunteers, who range in age from pre-teens to their 90s, results in hundreds of handmade pierogi and golabki, plus dozens of quarts of kapusta — all later frozen and sold in their parish store.

On Sundays from 11 a.m. to noon, St. Casimir’s Parish Store is open to the public. Pierogi sell for $11 per dozen, kapusta is $6 per quart, golabki $18 a dozen. Proceeds benefit the parish.

“This is a labor of love. We make these the old-fashioned way, with so many steps that it’s time-consuming. People often don’t have the time today,” said Joanne Menzia, who took part in the pierogi assembly line on Tuesday, along with more than a dozen other volunteers.

“People use pierogi as a side dish, a main dish, or even as an appetizer,” said Janice Klimczak. “We sell quite a lot of them.”

The store also sells for $12 each the parish’s new cookbook, A Taste of Heaven, featuring traditional Polish recipes from church members as well as recipes contributed by the church’s many non-Polish members.

Doing his own part in the pierogi assembly line was the pastor, the Rev. Andrzej Tenus, a native of northern Poland who came to the United States in 2006 speaking no English.

Tenus, a former Roman Catholic priest, born in 1972, and a current beekeeper, musician, husband and father of four, went to Pennsylvania to study English for three months at the Polish National Catholic Church headquarters. He was preparing for his new role as a pastor within the Polish National Catholic Church in the U.S.

He did pretty well with the Pennsylvania dialect; then he came to Lowell, where the Boston accent made it a little more difficult, he said, smiling. Today, Tenus has only a trace of a Polish accent, which belies the fact that he’s spoken English for less than a decade.

One of the questions he’s often asked from those outside the community is how the Polish National Catholic Church differs from the Roman Catholic Church. Many find it hard to grasp, he said, how a Catholic church in Lowell is not connected to the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston, that its bishops and priests (since 1921) are allowed to marry, and the church is democratic. Its governing board chooses the pastor, controls the finances, and the parish owns its assets.

The Polish National Catholic Church, according to its website, is a Christian denomination formed in 1897 in Scranton, Pa. While it serves the spiritual needs of its members, it also welcomes all people who wish to follow Christ. Today, there are more than 25,000 members in the United States.

The National Catholic movement, which encompasses more than the Polish National Church, resulted from the division in the Christian Church that similarly initiated the Protestant movement. However, according to the St. Patrick Catholic Church website, a National Catholic Church in Rhode Island, it differs from the Protestant divisions in that it kept its belief in the Mass and the priesthood necessary to have the Mass, as well as other Catholic rites and rituals.

The liturgy, especially the contemporary liturgy that Tenus is initiating at St. Casimir, closely resembles that of the Roman Catholic Church. Standing inside St. Casimir’s Church, which was built in 1908 for the then-large Polish community in the city’s Centralville neighborhood, is like standing inside any Roman Catholic Church.

“We keep the same beliefs. The difference is only in the administration level. We’re not connected to Rome,” said Tenus.

Tenus leads a busy life while living next to the church with his wife, Agnes, who followed her husband to the United States three months after his arrival. In Poland, Agnes trained as a nutritionist and professional cook. She creates recipes from her home country and often bakes desserts for home and the church with the honey Tenus harvests from three bee hives located at St. Casimir Cemetery in Pelham. Beekeeping was a hobby Tenus started in Poland and has since resurrected.

Their children, Karina, 13, Jonah, 9, Christoper, 6 and Amelia, 3, consider St. Casimir’s close-knit parish family as surrogate aunts, uncles and grandparents, Tenus said. Likewise, the parishioners love having them here, he added.

Tenus has many ideas to keep the small parish active within and outside the community, including a busy youth group that produces an annual talent show. He emphasizes the importance of welcoming others to their church.

“No matter your background, ethnicity or denomination, we don’t look at that. Just people with good will looking for some place to fill out their souls,” he said. “If you need comfort, a place to pray, this is the place. We do not judge — it’s not up to us to judge.”

Sunday Mass is offered at 10 a.m. at 268 Lakeview Ave., Lowell, followed by fellowship hour. For more information, visit the parish website, call 978-453-0742, or send an E-mail.

Watch live streaming video from StCasimirs at livestream.com
Events, Poland - Polish - Polonia, , , , , , ,

Martin Scorsese Presents Masterpieces of Polish Cinema

Martin Scorsese Presents: Masterpieces of Polish Cinema – A screening series of restored classic Polish films touring the U.S. and Canada, which opened at the Film Society of Lincoln Center in New York in February 2014.

The Masterpieces will be shown at the Cinema Arts Centre, at 423 Park Avenue, Huntington, NY from June 18th through July 23rd. More Masterpieces to come on July 9th, 13th, 16th and 23rd. Titles to be announced.

Organized and curated by Martin Scorsese, one of the most recognized and respected filmmakers in the world, the series is the largest presentation of restored Polish cinema to date.

21 Films you might not know

Martin Scorsese has personally selected 21 Polish films that have been an inspiration and influence.

30+ Theaters across North America

Martin Scorsese Presents: Masterpieces of Polish Cinema is an unprecedented cultural event. Polish cinema has never been showcased in North America on such a scale. The best in classic Polish film will be shown in cities in the U.S. and Canada throughout 2014, beginning with a special premiere presentation in New York City on February 5th.

Pristine quality

Films in the series will be presented in the highest possible quality thanks to extensive digital picture and audio restoration. Dirt, scratches and other ravages of time have been removed, while preserving the integrity and beauty of the original films.

Christian Witness, Events,

Invocation at Schenectady County Human Rights Commission Breakfast

Friends at the Schenectady County Human Rights Commission invited me to deliver the invocation at its 31st Annual Awards breakfast on Friday, May 23rd. I offered the following prayer:

Lord, You have called all of us to a path of freedom and justice; a restoration of relationships and the recognition of each person’s human dignity.

Enter into our hearts and minds and enflame our souls to see in each person another self. Grant that we may look past outward appearance to the essential relationships that prevail in Your kingdom. Help us to be more human. Restore and reconcile all relationships and enable us to take up our calling to restore a global human community, a single family fashioned in Your image.

Help us today to recognize and bless all those who have labored so diligently to establish a new equality of participation in our community and across the globe. Bless the work of all who labor to end the sources of human conflict — race, class, wealth, gender, servitude, forced labor, wage theft, military opposition, indebtedness, imprisonment, coercion, despair, anxiety, self-centeredness, alienation, anxiety, greed, separation, prejudice, and injustice— so that we may rise above our baser selves. Fashion us into images of Your Divinity and justice.

Finally grant us a freedom that surpasses personal autonomy and help us to recognize our continuing dependence on You as our Creator and Your call to see each other as another self through lives committed to knowing, loving and serving You and each other. Amen

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Events, Poetry, Poland - Polish - Polonia, , , , , , ,

Preserving language – beauty and distinctiveness

The nuances in Polish language make it particularly beautiful, poetic, and musical. In addition, it allows for plays in language that are useful in conveying meaning and humor. It has helped Poland and Poles everywhere in standing up to countries and dictators.

From the Associated Press via Yahoo News: Poland campaigns to preserve its complex spelling

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Polish language experts launched a campaign Thursday to preserve the challenging system of its diacritical marks, saying the tails, dots and strokes are becoming obsolete under the pressure of IT and speed.

The drive, initiated by the state-run Council of the Polish Language, is part of the UNESCO International Mother Language Day. The campaign’s Polish name is complicated for a non-Polish keyboard: “Je,zyk polski jest a,-e,.”

That’s a pun meaning that Polish language needs its tails and is top class. Part of the meaning is lost and the pronunciation sounds wrong if the marks aren’t there.

alfabetComputer and phone keyboards require users to punch additional keys for Polish alphabet. To save time, Poles skip the nuances, and sometimes need to guess the meaning of the message that they have received. This is also true for IT equipment users of other languages with diacritical marks…

As part of the new campaign, some radio and TV stations are playing songs with words stripped of diacritical pronunciation, making them sound odd to the Polish ear. A rap song concludes: “Press the right Alt sometimes” to obtain Polish letters, referring one of the keyboard buttons that Poles need to press to write characters with diacritical marks.

In Poland, linguist Jerzy Bralczyk said the diacritical marks are a visual, defining feature of the Polish language, and they carry meaning and enrich the speech.

“Today, the Polish language is threatened by the tendency to avoid its characteristic letters,” Bralczyk said. “The less we use diacritical marks in text messages, the more likely they are to vanish altogether. That would mean an impoverishment of the language and of our life. I would be sorry.”

The tails make “a” and “e” nasal, strokes over “s,” “c” and “n” soften them and sometimes make them whistling sound, a stroke across “l” makes it sound like the English “w,” and a dot over “z” makes it hard like a metal drill. And each change matters.

“Los” means “fate,” but when you put a slash across the “l” and add a stroke over the “s” it becomes “elk.” “Paczki” are “parcels,” but “pa,czki” are doughnuts.

Foreigners who know Polish say the diacritical marks are a visual sign that it’s a tough language and that they add to the complexity of the grammar and vocabulary, which does not derive from Latin or from Germanic languages.

…

In Romania, the tongue’s tails on “t” and “s,” circumflexes on “a” and “I” and hats on “a” are ignored even by state officials and institutes. Some words have up to four diacritical marks, and not using them changes the pronunciation and, in some cases, the meaning, to the point of no meaning at all.

Christian Witness, PNCC, , ,

PNCC parishioner enjoys life and works hard at 94

From the Observer-Reporter: 94 year old not slowing down
Energetic 94 year-old helps local church with fish fry deliveries

Every Friday during the Lenten season … the volunteers at Holy Trinity National Catholic Church fish fry dash around the kitchen, frying and cooking sandwiches, cabbage and sauerkraut, pierogies and french fries.

And every week, parishioner Ted Sikora, who celebrates his 94th birthday today, shows up, ready to deliver lunch orders.

Sikora might be the most popular delivery man in Washington County.

Customers enjoy it when Sikora cheerily arrives, carrying brown bags filled with fish, and spends a few minutes chatting.

“He’s never met a stranger. People are amazed by the fact that he’s 94,” said Sikora’s son, Tom, who helps coordinate the parish fish fry. “He loves talking to people.”

Sikora said he’s cut back the amount of deliveries he makes to four or five on Fridays, but he enjoys making his rounds.

“I like to be active around the church and help around the fish fry,” said Sikora, who served as an altar boy at the church for more than a decade as he was growing up.

He shows no signs of slowing down. Sikora gets up at about 7 a.m. every morning and hits the gym, exercising for about two hours at the Cameron Wellness Center. Three times a week, he takes Zumba classes and he swims daily.

Sikora lives on his own, in the house that he built in Washington in 1949 (“I did everything but the plaster and the furnace; I nailed every board, laid every brick, and I’m proud of it,” he said) and he plants a garden every spring.

He’s fit and healthy, and the only concession he’s made to getting older is wearing a pair of hearing aids. And he also enjoys indulging in cookies.

Sikora is also one of the most optimistic and happy men you’re likely to meet.

“I’m very happy with the life I led, and not may people can live a long life and be so happy,” he said.

He and his wife, Mildred, were married for 61 years before she passed away in 2007, and Sikora credits her for much of his happiness.

The two met at Washington Park, where Sikora had gone to listen to an orchestra. He thought she was pretty, so he asked her to dance.

“The next thing you know, we were getting married. I had a very happy marriage,” said Sikora. “My wife and I raised four kids and we had a happy time doing it. She had a tough time at the end and I took care of her for the past several years, but I owed it to her. She was quite a wife and we had a great marriage.”

Sikora worked as a machinist for the Pennsylvania Transformer and served as a mechanic in the U.S. Air Force during World War II.

Sikora’s mother lived to be 103, and he currently holds the title as the oldest parishioner.

He attends mass every Sunday, and then hosts a brunch at his house.

And, of course, looks forward to the fish fries.

“I’ll keep on doing that for a long time,” said Sikora. “It’s been a bright life. I love my family and my friends. I have a lot of friends, and that makes me feel great.”

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