There is an official statement by the director of the Polish Institute about the closure of the Cardinal Adam Maida Alumni Library. Surprisingly, this was not issued by the Executive Committee responsible for the daily operations of the OLS, but only by the director of the Institute who is in OLS from June this year and has nothing to do with the library. As a reminder, the library was always under the supervision of the Seminary, never the Polish Mission (Institute).
In the first part he talks about the plan and the future of some books which are going to be under the supervision of the Institute. For the sake of all of us, especially those who founded the library, donated books, read them and took care of them for so many years, we wish the Institute success. It will be a difficult job for a very small group of people working for the Institute to fulfill the obligations specified in the plan. They need our prayer and gratitude.
The second part is all about the members of the Polskie Lobby. We are being accused of lying and spreading false information about the library and the employees of OLS. He also states that we believe to represent and “speak for the Polish community”. He proclaims to be open and transparent to anyone except members of the Polskie Lobby.
First of all, we stand behind the information which we shared with members of the Polskie Lobby and Polish Americans about the library; collections are not in the library, shelves are demolished and moved away very early in the morning on Saturday August 13, 2022, and the library building is being prepared for classrooms. Secondly, the pictures dated August 16, 2022, are current and speaks for themselves. Thirdly, we never said that we represented the Polish community, we only inform them about subjects be believe that it may be of interest to them. And the last point, why to talk about transparency and openness when our members have been excluded and what is even worse employees of the Institute are forbidden to talk or contact any member of the Polskie Lobby. It is the limitation of the freedom of the speech for employees of the Institute and OLS.
We tried to talk to the director of the Institute and to the director of the Board of the Institute without success. Only responds were more accusations and disregards toward our members and our cause. If someone is interested in our correspondence with them on the subject above, please let us know. We have nothing to hide and are more than happy to share all the emails. We sincerely believe in transparency and real conversation.
Renata and Jolanta
