“Beacon Hill American Czestochowa” is a documentary film that was shown to the Polish community for the first time on Tuesday in New York. It shows the fate of the Marian sanctuary in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, founded in 1955, and its founder and builder Father Michał Zembrzuski.
The 35-minute documentary illustrates the history of the temple of the Pauline Fathers, which is also an oasis of Polishness and patriotism of the Polish community on American soil. It was originally built as a chapel converted from a barn, which one of the Philadelphia cardinals compared to the way of Jesus, starting from the stable in Bethlehem.
The document shows the efforts of the founder of the present National Sanctuary of Our Lady of Częstochowa, Father Michał Zembrzuski (1908-2003), who, with the blessing of, among others, Stefan Wyszyński and Karol Wojtyła, then cardinals, undertook the work of collecting the necessary funds for the purchase of land, erection of the building and its extension.
US President Lyndon Baines Johnson attended the consecration ceremony of the new temple in 1966, and Ronald Reagan arrived there in 1984. It has become a place of pilgrimage for hundreds of thousands of believers of Polish descent from all over the United States and Americans of various races and nationalities. The shrine was visited twice by the archbishop, and then by Cardinal Wojtyła.
Ignacy J. Paderewski’s heart is located in the temple. In the cemetery, the most important military outside Poland, there are graves of over 2,300 veterans of World War I and II, including participants in the Polish-Bolshevik war, the Home Army, and the Cursed Soldiers. Among them are e.g. commanders of: 303 Squadron – Gen. Witold Urbanowicz, Pomeranian Army – Gen. Władysław Bortnowski, Świętokrzyska Brigade of the National Armed Forces – Col. Antoni Szacki, Cichociemni, including Jerzy Lerski, a courier of the Polish government in exile, as well as the Government Delegate for Poland Stefan Korboński.
The premiere of the documentary coincides with the 20th anniversary of the death of O. Zembrzuski, as well as the 80th anniversary of the film’s co-organizer, the New York Piłsudski Institute in cooperation with the Polish and Slavic Center (CPS).
The originator, author of the script and the first producer of the documentary is a Polish doctor from New York, Dr. Henryk Cioczek. TvP in Lublin became interested in the project and took over the main production directed by Jarosław Mazur, a graduate of the Łódź film school, who is also the cinematographer.
As Dr. Cioczek told PAP, he was inspired to make the documentary by meeting O. Zembrzuski, which turned into friendship.
“I quickly realized how big and versatile he was. I am aware of his merits as a clergyman, but also a man who enriches the collective life of the Polish community,” added the Polish doctor.
He pointed out that Paulin was the founder not only of the American Czestochowa, which became a monument that could not be built in Poland during the times of the People’s Republic of Poland on the millennium of Baptism in 1966. Paulin also participated in the establishment of many other Polish community institutions, such as CPS, Polish & Slavic Federal Credit Union, “Nowy Dziennik”, as well as the “Unitas” clinic for patients with problems with addiction to various substances, as well as with mental health.
“I knew I was dealing with an extraordinary personality. I decided to record it for posterity. In the future, I would also like to use the materials from the beginnings of Father Zembrzuski’s ministry in the Pauline Order in Hungary, where he saved over 1,000 Jews, mainly Polish, announced Cioczek, a practicing physician, author of six books on history and popular science, including a Nobel laureate for discovery of the structure of DNA, James Watson, two plays and many articles.
“Beacon Hill American Częstochowa” won one of the main awards at the Polish Film Festival in Chicago in 2020 in the “Fate of Poles” category.
From New York Andrzej Dobrowolski (PAP)
ad/ kgod/