Z Mandżurii do Garbowa. Kapłańska droga ks. Dominika Przyłuskiego 1872-1942

Abstract

Rev. Dominik Przyłuski on all accounts deserves a separate biography. He was born in 1872 in Buchalowice in the Puławy administrative unit to a large peasant’s family. He was ordained to the priesthood on 3rd July 1898 in the Lublin cathedral. In the beginning fulfilled his pastoral functions at Lublin churches, i.e. in the post-Dominican church he helped Rev. Ignacy Kłopotowski, the rector of that church and social worker of high esteem. For four years he was a curate to St. Paul’s. On the Feast of the Epiphany in 1905 he went to the Asiatic part of Russia as a chaplain to the Polish soldiers in the tsarist army. They fought in the war between Russia and Japan then. He was very brave in his ministry, and when machine guns did down, he started his pastoral activity among the Poles in the immense territories of Manchuria. They had chosen the town of Harbin as the centre of their religious and patriotic life. In 1906 Rev. Dominik had settled in that town and together with his compatriots and set about the construction of a church. The Poles-exiles had a accurate vision about what a priest should do. He was to be their leader in the life of the Polish diaspora among the Russian-Chinese majority. And in that nook of the world they cared about the propagation of the faith, propagation of education, and strengthened patriotic awareness. In the years 1906-1907 the church, the school and the library adjacent to the church were roofed. The construction was completed, however, by another priest. Rev. Antoni Maczuk, in 1909. The church was consecrated on 1st August 1909 by the Mohylew bishop Jan Cieplak. Rev. Dominik arrived in his mother Lublin diocese in 1909. He worked in turn in Urzędów (1909-1911), in Kumów (1911-1920) where apart from being a parish priest he took part in the works of the local Agricultural Circle and Polish Mother Country School. He defended his faithful against the restrictions of the Russian and Austrian Military Authorities. In the end of the First World War he founded village schools and libraries in the parish under his jurisdiction. In 1920 he was nominated to be a parish priest in Garbów, where he spent the last twenty-two years of his life. Not only did he support his parishioners in their faith, but carried on some urgent redecoration works in the Garbów church destroyed by the war. He helped those parishioners who were poor. Together with Janina Studzińska he organized a poor-house for the impoverished and older inhabitants of the parish in Garbów. He organized three new parishes here: in Jastków, Tomaszowice and Starościn. For his persistent pastoral and organiaztional work the Lublin Bishop L. Fulman bestowed on him an honorary title of the canon of the Zamość chapter in 1928. When the times of contempt for human rights and principles came. Rev. Przyluski protected the believers of the Mosaic religion. His earthly remains were buried at the parochial cemetery in Garbów. A recollection of him is still alive in the grateful memory of the oldest parishioners in Garbów. Rev. Przyluski died on 22nd December 1942.