Rev. Marcel Guarnizo is a strange bird with some strange connections:

[hedgehog]

UBJECT: RUSSIANS IN ROME SAY ORTHODOX/VATICAN TENSIONS ARE
AT HIGHEST LEVEL IN YEARS


CLASSIFIED BY: AMBASSADOR JIM NICHOLSON FOR REASONS 1.5 (A) AND (D).

1. (C) SUMMARY: OVER THE COURSE OF THE LAST FEW WEEKS, DCM
MET SEPARATELY WITH FATHER MARCEL GUARNIZO, PRESIDENT OF
THE AID TO THE CHURCH IN RUSSIA, FATHER FILIPP OF THE RUSSIAN
ORTHODOX CHURCH IN ROME, AND DIMITRI SHTODIN, DCM AT THE
CONFIDENTIAL

PAGE 02 VATICA 02291 01 OF 02 101502Z
RUSSIAN EMBASSY TO THE HOLY SEE. ALL ASSERT THAT
RUSSIAN/VATICAN RELATIONS ARE AT A 10-YEAR LOW. FATHER
MARCEL BLAMES IT ON THE INCREASING INSECURITY OF PATRIARCH
ALEXI AND RUSSIAN ORTHODOX "FOREIGN MINISTER" KYRILL. FATHER
FILIPP STATES THAT THE PROBLEM IS THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH'S
"AGGRESSIVE" PROSELYTISM, WHILE SHTODIN SEES IT AS A
MANIFESTATION OF AN ETHNIC RUSSIAN/ETHNIC POLE CONFRONTATION
WITHIN THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION. NONE OF THE THREE SEE ANY
SHORT-TERM IMPROVEMENT. END SUMMARY


http://leaks.hohesc.us/?view=02VATICAN2291


Father Guarnizo, you are a native of Columbia, but were raised in the suburbs of Washington, D.C. In 2001, as a young priest, you felt called to found the Educational Initiative for Central and Eastern Europe. Could you explain the mission of the organization, and the experiences that inspired you to found it?

Guarnizo: In 1993, I went to Russia. The Berlin Wall, of course, had fallen four years earlier. The Soviet Union had only been officially dissolved two years earlier, on Dec. 25, 1991. I experienced a strong call to help rebuild the Church in the post-communist world.

I began with another organization, Aid to the Church in Russia, which dedicated itself to rebuilding churches in Russia that had been desecrated during the regime. We were able to rebuild quite a few Catholic churches in Russia. But after about 10 years, I began to realize that rebuilding churches was not going to be enough.

What was needed was a movement to create a new intellectual culture in the post-communist countries of Central and Eastern Europe.

http://www.kaldu.org/2009/12/Dec26_09E1.html



On 25-27 May 2001 the Catholic Church in Russia celebrated its tenth anniversary of freedom, and Aid to the Church in Russia (A. C. R.), a non-profit organization based in the Diocese of Arlington, Virginia (Great Falls), was invited to participate in the festivities. Christopher B. Briggs, executive director of A. C. R. and a parishioner at Our Lady of Hope in Sterling, VA, represented the organization at the celebrations. During most of the past decade A. C. R. has been major contributor to some of the most important projects in the Church in Russia.


Founded in 1994, Aid to the Church in Russia (A. C. R.), has been actively engaged in the one meaningful answer to that question: the reconstruction of the Church and society in the East. Since that year, A. C. R. has been a source of major funding for the Church, making significant donations to, among other things, the following projects:

…reconstruction of Mary Queen of the Apostles Seminary, St. Petersburg

…reconstruction of Cathedral of the Assumption, St. Petersburg

…reconstruction of the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception, Moscow

…reconstruction of St. Louis of France, Moscow

…construction of the Cathedral of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Irkutsk, Siberia

The founder of A. C. R. is Rev. Marcel Guarnizo, a native of Washington, D.C., a graduate of O’Connell High School, and at the time of A. C. R.’s founding, a seminarian in Rome. In 1998, after his training there, Rev. Guarnizo, was ordained to the priesthood for the Apostolic Administration of European Russia by Archbishop Tadeusz Kondrusiewicz.

http://www.aidrussia.org/Reports_Detail.asp?Title=Ten%20Year%20Anniversary%20of%20the%20Re-established%20Catholic%20Church%20in%20Russia

[xchrom]

1. Very interesting! Nt