Kraków’s cardinal after deadly shooting: The final word does not belong to hatred, but love

(OSV News) — As Kraków mourned the victims of a mass shooting Nov. 7 that left six people dead in the city’s historic Main Market Square, Cardinal Grzegorz Rys urged residents not to surrender to fear and hatred, delivering a powerful homily Nov. 8 on suffering, faith and the hope that death does not have the final word.

Preaching at St. Anne’s Church, merely 1,300 feet from where the shooting began, and where hundreds gathered to pray for the dead, the wounded and their families, Cardinal Rys admitted that human words were insufficient in the face of such horror.

“Our human capacities at moments like these come down to being present,” he said. “If it were not for the word of God, I would have nothing to say to you.”

Drawing on St. Paul’s First Letter to the Thessalonians, the cardinal reminded the congregation that only Christian hope is something that can help the city’s community get through the tragedy.

Christians have every right to grieve, but not as those “who have no hope,” Cardinal Rys said.

— ‘Jesus is faster than bullets. Jesus lulled them all to sleep’ —

He pointed to the apostle’s description of the dead as those who have fallen asleep, explaining that Christian faith sees death not as the end of a person’s journey but as a passage toward God.

“Someone might say that we are trying to trivialize the tragedy, or trivialize death. No,” Cardinal Rys said. “We only express our deep faith and hope that yesterday one person was shooting at our brothers and sisters, while someone else was laying them down to sleep. Jesus is faster than bullets. Jesus lulled them all to sleep.”

The cardinal said Christian hope also means that death cannot permanently separate people from those they love.

“Death does not sever relationships. Death does not sever closeness. Death does not sever bonds,” he said, adding that such bonds will ultimately be restored in Christ. “The final word belongs to God. The final word belongs to life. The final word belongs to love. It does not belong to hatred, death or tragedy.”

— Perpetrator died in a hospital, wounded policemen in stable condition —

The homily came as investigators continued piecing together the circumstances of one of the deadliest shootings in modern Polish history.

The gunman, identified by Police as 24-year-old Michal Oksinski, died in a Kraków hospital early Nov. 9 after being shot by police officers during his arrest. Investigators believe he was also responsible for the deaths of his parents and sister, whose bodies were found at the family’s home. The motive of his deadly raid remained under investigation.

His shooting spree started on a Saturday afternoon, when Main Market Square was full of people. Police immediately started chasing him and roughly three minutes later apprehended him at an intersection between the historic Old Town and Jewish district Kazimierz. Regular city patrol of Police — Jakub Kulik, 24, and Artur Moranski, 27 — chased the gunman and apprehended him without special protective clothing. Their condition is severe, but stable.

Poland mourns victims with two days of national mourning that started Nov. 8. Four of the victims were Polish, one was a British citizen and another Austrian, while five foreign nationals were among the wounded. One of the casualties of the attack was Izabela Wozna, a 53-year-old mother of four children, including 11-year-old twins. Wozna was a painter who came to visit Kraków to see an artistic exhibition.

The sister of the perpetrator, Magdalena Oksinska, was also an artist, a third-year student of the Academy of Fine Arts in Kraków.

— Hope inseparable from love, cardinal says —

Cardinal Rys insisted that hope is inseparable from love — and warned against allowing the tragedy to destroy either.

“You have hope for this city when you love it. You have hope for our homeland when you love it. You have hope for the people you meet on the street when you love them,” he said. “We will not let aggression, hatred, evil or divisions take love away from us, because then we lose hope.”

Cardinal Rys also urged people to focus on the opportunities to do good: “Are you afraid? Do you not know what to do? Look at your calendar and see what you have to do tomorrow,” he said. “And do it as well as you can. And do it God’s way.”

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