Sister Kolumba Meets a Priest Who Is a Kindred Spirit to Begin Her Foundation
Przemyśl, where Mother Kolumba met Father Leszczyński to plan the foundation.
This is the continuation of the story of the life of the Mother Maria Kolumba, foundress of the Dominican Sisters of the Immaculate Conception. In our previous installment, Sister Kolumba, only 19 and temporarily professed, had travelled from her convent in France to her native Poland to try to find support for the foundation of a Third Order Dominican convent in that land.
At this time, a priest by the name of Father Julian Leszczyński was looking for Dominican Sisters for his new parish assignment in Wielowieś. This priest had such a devotion to Dominican Sisters that when he was in the seventh and eighth grades he would draw pictures of cloistered Dominican convents, for example, of those in Warsaw, giving names to imaginary Sisters.
Answer to Prayer
One day in April 1860, while living in the Benedictine convent, one of the Sisters informed Sister Kolumba, who was only 19, that a priest was waiting to see her. Father Leszczyński had found out about the purpose of Sister Kolumba while visiting the convent and he hastened to learn more and ask about everything.
They met and talked. Her biographer relates,
What feelings of happiness and gratitude towards the Lord filled Sister Maria Kolumba’s heart after this conversation, replete with hope over the meeting with the Priest Leszczyński! Having left the parlor, she went straight to the chapel, and lying prostrate before the Lord latent in the Holy Sacrament, she gave thanksgiving in her soul for this star shining over her and the future convent. She sacrificed herself in the spirit of gratitude to Lord, awaiting to accept all crosses and suffering which might await her while conducting the work of the Foundation.
From that moment Sister Maria Kolumba along with her mother and Father Leszczyński started to take the first steps toward the convent in Wielowieś. They presented the plan to the Most Rev. Wierzchlejewski, the Bishop of Przemyśl, who kindly accepted the proposal, blessed Sister Maria Kolumba, and encouraged her in her work.
