Knowing Ukraine family members still alive helps St. Pascal principal start her day

Inna Collier Paske works full-time as principal of St. Pascal Regional Catholic School in St. Paul. But since Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine, staying in touch with her parents and sister back in their hometown in central Ukraine has become something of a second job, she said.

“I can’t go to bed until I talk to them, so I know that they are OK. Then in the morning, before I go to work, I talk with them.”

Sometimes the worries are excruciating, she said.

The moment she receives a video call or chat from her family each morning “and knows that they are alive,” she has the momentum to take on the day and persevere, focus on tasks and on those in her care, said Collier Paske, 37. Spending time with the Lord and praying has become the main way to support her family and friends in Ukraine, she said.

Family members living in her hometown include her father, a plumber and electrician, her mother, a retired kindergarten teacher, and her sister, who lives there with her husband, a farm implement dealer, and younger daughter.

Her sister’s older daughter attends school in Lithuania and works for a humanitarian aid organization that helps coordinate other charitable organizations’ services to vulnerable populations in Ukraine, including families and children who need help evacuating.

Since Russia’s invasion, her hometown in central Ukraine, which The Catholic Spirit is not naming due to safety concerns, has become the site of “lots of Ukrainian tanks” traveling through, as well as refugees, “a lot of refugees,” Collier Paske said. The town’s sports center has become a military base where residents see soldiers conducting drills.

“I’m just grateful there is no bombing there at this point,” she said. “When you hear the news of just bombing randomly, you never know.”

One way Collier Paske cheers up her family is telling them how her school’s students and staff support her and the people of Ukraine. Telling those stories is encouraging and lets them know they are not forgotten, she said.

In addition to her immediate family, Collier Paske has relatives and friends in other parts of Ukraine.

The husband of one friend serves in the military, and she has fled the country with their two young children. “Right now, she’s stuck in Denmark and trying to get a visa to the United States so she can stay with me,” Collier Paske said.

An aunt who lives in western Ukraine has friends who fled to Poland. But it is overcrowded and the family is running out of money, Collier Paske said. “They only get food like twice a week and can’t afford it anymore. They are so desperate now they are going back to Ukraine.”

Collier Paske emigrated from Ukraine in 2004 as a foreign exchange student. After a year, she returned to her home country to continue her studies, earning her first master’s degree. In 2009, she returned to the U.S., where she studied school counseling at St. Cloud State University in St. Cloud, married and made Minnesota her home.

What’s happening in her home country has her increasingly worried, particularly for people trying to flee but facing long lines on roads, perhaps needing a car. Male citizens ages 18-60 are not allowed to leave.

Her parents do not drive and her niece is now afraid to. “At every post, people check your documents and can hold a gun on you,” Collier Paske said. Travelers never know which checkpoint they will arrive at — whether manned by Ukrainians or Russians. “For everybody, it’s a very traumatic experience,” she said.

Collier Paske’s parents were supposed to visit Minnesota this summer. “We bought them a ticket to take them to Hawaii,” she said, “and I don’t know if I will even see them again. And then how to reunite my family.” She offered her niece in Lithuania the chance to stay in Minnesota, but her niece said, ‘If I stay here, at least I’m close to my family (in Ukraine).’”

Before Russia’s invasion, Collier Paske had urged her parents to leave Ukraine. She believes now the safest place for them is their hometown. She also hopes the U.S. government simplifies the visa process for Ukrainians, “so I can reunite with my family once it’s safe for them to leave Ukraine.”

Her 6-year-old daughter made “a heartbreaking video” asking her family to leave, adding that “it’s safe here, and bring as many Ukrainians as you can with you.” Her parents declined because they didn’t think a war would start, or if there was an invasion, it would be contained to eastern Ukraine.

Collier Paske’s brother-in-law serves in territorial defense in Ukraine, and her sister “can’t leave him behind; she wants to stay with him.” A cousin who was drafted asked Collier Paske to pray for him.

“More than anything, this brought Ukraine together, having more pride about being Ukrainian, and then just brought them to God,” she said. People tell her they feel the prayers, she said. “That’s what we do.”

Prayer helps her a lot, too, she said, especially when it sometimes feels like the end of the world. “Just knowing that God takes care of them,” she said.

Like many people in Ukraine, Collier Paske grew up Eastern Orthodox. But at age 10 she converted to the Baptist faith. Today, she attends a nondenominational church.

She never expected God’s path for her would include serving a Catholic school. But when she came to St. Pascal in 2017, becoming principal in 2018, she saw people were seeking God and she said, “This is it. I’m helping them.”

Many students at St. Pascal didn’t grow up speaking English, she said, so she has worked to create a system where parents won’t face language barriers when bringing their children to a Catholic school.

Faith is important for Ukraine, for herself, for her family, Collier Paske said. She said there are billboards in Ukraine with messages like, “Come to God. God is our shield. If NATO won’t shield the skies, God will shield us.”

“I never thought the whole world would learn about faith through Ukraine,” she said. “That it’s Ukrainians evangelizing the whole world right now, how they believe in God, how they pray for each other,” and how the military kneels in prayer before each battle, she said.

The world is watching, she said.

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CLASSROOM LESSONS

Another educator in Catholic schools in the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis recently brought her Ukrainian heritage and requests for prayers concerning Russia’s invasion of Ukraine into the classroom.

Maria Zownirowycz, 32, who was born in the U.S. but had a Ukrainian grandfather, has taught history to eighth graders at Immaculate Conception Catholic School in Columbia Heights, where she recently began a leave of absence. Classroom discussion sometimes included current events in Ukraine.

A March 15 history class included Ukrainian Easter traditions, with Zownirowycz dressed in a traditional Ukrainian blouse and black pants. The conversation also touched on Russia’s attack.

She also discusses events in Ukraine with two of her 22 cousins who live there, including near-daily contact with one of her cousins, a 36-year-old tutor. Recently, her cousin messaged Zownirowycz about her Catholic faith and lifelong church attendance, but said she recently stopped believing and praying. “I can’t for now,” she said.

Her cousin wants NATO to intervene in Ukraine but said “everybody is afraid of Russia.” War is not as it should be, her cousin said, with Russian troops firing at civilian targets.

Some of Zownirowycz’s relatives in Ukraine recently told her they are no longer able to go to work. “I don’t know how they are getting food,” she said.

She said the situation in Ukraine has helped her appreciate the blessings of family, friends, her faith, and freedom of speech, freedom of faith and “the freedom to be the best version of myself.”

On March 10, Zownirowycz’s uncle in the Twin Cities, Bob Kuczwarskyj, said relatives in western Ukraine were no longer going to school or work, except one who works for the railroad. Shops were still open but “it’s pretty much martial law in that part of Ukraine,” he said.

One cousin refuses to leave, he said. Another is very anxious and has gathered documents in case she needs to leave on short notice.

An older cousin said, “Where am I going to go? This is my home. This is what I know.”