West Virginia parishes, people help Ukrainians find safe haven in Mountain State

MARTINSBURG, W.Va. (OSV News) — On a visit to her beloved home country a few years ago, Veronika McCann of Martinsburg, W.Va., thought to herself, “My Ukraine is blossoming.”

She and her husband, Brian, originally from Berkeley Springs, W.Va., and their daughter Oxana were visiting Veronika’s mother and father and younger sisters.

Veronika noticed how nice the community looked, that the economy was good, and the many flowers adorning the streets and businesses of her hometown. It’s a cherished memory of happy times before the horror that befell her homeland, and before her family’s life would be changed forever.

Veronika was pregnant with her son, Artur, when the Russian invasion of Ukraine began Feb. 24, 2022. Helplessly watching the images on the news, she knew her family was in the center of it all.

“Awful” was all Veronika could say about how she felt. After some time and effort, her mother, Oksana, and two younger sisters, Mariia and Anna, were able to leave Ukraine and are now safe in Martinsburg with her.

Veronika’s father is unable to leave Ukraine, and her mother’s side of the family is in an area under occupation. Veronika’s grandmother died in Ukraine just the week before. “We couldn’t even go to say our last goodbyes and hold her hand for one more time,” Veronika told The Catholic Spirit, newspaper of the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston, W.Va.

Veronika is channeling her anger and grief into the efforts of St. Joseph Parish in Martinsburg to help more Ukrainian families, just like her own, to leave the war-torn country and find hope and safety in the state’s Eastern Panhandle. Anna, 12, is now enrolled at St. Joseph Parish School.

The first of three families — a mother and father and their 10-year-old daughter and 4-year-old son — arrived in Martinsburg Jan. 20. Their daughter also is now enrolled at St. Joseph School.

“What was truly heartwarming was watching Anna, our first Ukrainian student, translating for them and showing the whole family around the school,” said Patrick Michel, parish operations and financial officer at St. Joseph Parish and a member of the parish’s Ukrainian Ministry Committee. He remembered when Anna spoke little English.

“She is now a pro!” said Michel, who also is a deacon candidate for the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston.

A generous parishioner is providing housing for the family in an apartment that the parish group helped furnish through the kindness of that same parishioner, Michel said. All of the kitchen supplies such as dishes are supplied by a group in the area called Sister Act.

Michel added that the two other families are in various stages of paperwork and will live in the same building as the first family.

The parish’s Ukrainian Ministry Committee was formed shortly after the war began last year at the urging of parishioners Clarence “CEM” Martin and Ben Slominski.

Michel said the parish received a great amount of support in efforts from St. Bernadette Parish in Hedgesville. Together, the two parishes conducted a children’s clothing drive, collecting 18 huge boxes of clothing which they sent to Ukraine.

The St. James Furniture Ministry of St. James the Greater Parish in Charles Town is helping supply furniture for the apartments for the families. The three parishes also joined together, Michel said, for a fundraiser with all money raised supporting the Ukrainian families coming to Martinsburg.

“We are working with Catholic Charities to help resettle these wonderful folks and we have already established Ukrainian families who are acting as point people to support these families,” Michel said.

St. Joseph’s is working through the federal Uniting for Ukraine program, through which Americans can sponsor families and bring them to the U.S. Launched by the Biden administration April 21, 2022, the program is run by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.

Renee Corbett, outreach worker with Catholic Charities West Virginia’s Refugee Resettlement and Immigration Services in Martinsburg, has been helping to connect Ukrainian families with services available to them in the community. She said her office is working with 42 Ukrainians in 10 counties of West Virginia.

Corbett said Veronika has been a true movement maker for Ukrainian unity — “a real force of nature.”

“It’s been so incredible for me to get to work with her and with so many of these Ukrainian families,” Corbett said. “It’s been wonderful to see so many people coming together to support them.”

That support also is overflowing in Weirton, where many Catholics have joined with others in the community to bring families to safety through the Uniting for Ukraine program.

Dan McCune and his wife, Patti, who are members of St. Joseph the Worker Parish in Weirton, West Virginia, knew they had to do something to help.

“We were watching the news and what was happening … we started to put ourselves into their shoes,” he said.

The McCunes and many other Weirton Catholics learned about the Uniting for Ukraine program.

“It provides them two years of sanctuary here in the United States,” McCune said.

The three families that have come to Weirton through sponsors in Weirton are a man and his wife and their 15-month-old; a man and his wife and their children who are now in sixth grade and 11th grade at Madonna High School and fifth grade at St. Joseph the Worker Grade School; and another girl who is a seventh grader at Madonna. Her mother and brother had to return to Ukraine to run the family’s grocery store.

All of the families in Weirton are Byzantine Catholic and attend Mass at St. Mary’s Byzantine Catholic Church in Weirton.

The father in one of the families has been back and forth from Ukraine because he is a Byzantine Catholic priest. He is pastor of two parishes in Ukraine with 600 parishioners. When in Weirton, he has concelebrated Masses at St. Mary’s Byzantine.

Tetyana Marshall, a member of the St. Joseph’s Ukrainian Ministry Committee, said she is so grateful to the parish for what they are doing to help Ukrainians. Originally from Ukraine, she moved to the Martinsburg area years ago and her daughter is a first grader at St. Joseph School.

St. Joseph’s parishioners “don’t have any kind of personal relationship to Ukraine,” Marshall said. “They don’t have to do anything to help Ukraine … I’m just amazed how kind people’s hearts are.”

Colleen Rowan is executive editor of The Catholic Spirit, newspaper of the Diocese of Wheeling-Charleston.

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