They Call Me the Bacon Priest

In 1947, under orders of his superiors, Father Werenfried left the silence of the Abbey to endeavour to relieve the distress of the millions of refugees that as a consequence of the war had fled from Eastern to Western Europe.Nobody could guess that the still youthful Norbertine father would become the inspiring and indefatigable organizer of an International of Christian Brotherly Love.Under his leadership Iron Curtain Church Relief grew from an action for the relief of refugees to the great Auxiliary for the persecuted Church and oppressed peoples in Eastern Europe and Asia that it has since become. He founded the international Building Order and became perhaps the most irresistible mendicant preacher of our times. Churches, convents, chapel-trucks, shelters for the homeless, books, medicaments, tens of thousands of gift parcels of food and clothing, thousands of young refugees studying for the priesthood and hundreds of priests that became motorized, are the tangible witnesses to the generosity and self-denial engendered by Father Werenfried through his spoken and written word. The fruits of this have fed, fortified, encouraged and consoled countless numbers behind the Iron Curtain as far as Siberia and China.In this way "WERENFRIED", the "Bacon Priest s" monastic name meaning CHAMPION FOR PEACE became for millions of people in East and West a symbol of faith in a better future and of peace!In this book Father Werenfried himself has written the fascinating and impressive story of a modern apostleship of practical love.