Just minutes before the bells above the Ukrainian Catholic Metropolitan Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Philadelphia rang to call Catholics to Sunday Mass, some gathered on the steps despite the brutal freezing temperatures, sharing updates they had seen on the news or whispers of rumors they had heard from a relative who heard from a friend in Ukraine about some new development concerning the Russian invasion.
Others simply walked up the stairs, heads down and hands thrust into the pockets on their way to do the only thing they could think to do — pray.
“We came to pray,” said Peter and Terry Sikora, a married couple in Philadelphia. “That is what we can do.”
Nora Little, also of Philadelphia, said she didn’t even belong to that Ukrainian Greek Catholic parish but felt called to return there as a show of support. “I just felt I had to be here today,” she said. “This was my grandparents’ parish.”
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