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Saint Raphael Kalinowski

Father Raphael Kalinowski, 1897

Preface

This is a page about my great great grand uncle, Saint Raphael (Joseph) Kalinowski (1835-1907), the brother of my great-great-grandfather. For genealogists reading this, the direct line from me to him is: Elonka Dunin -> my father, Stanley Dunin -> his mother, Sophie Werner (Dunin) -> her mother, Zofia Kalinowska (Werner) -> her father, Gabriel Kalinowski -> his brother, Joseph (Raphael) Kalinowski. Check here for more info on the family tree

I have attempted to pull in information from multiple sources: Books, websites, news articles, and family stories and photographs. If you know of any errors in this information, or have additional bits and pieces to add, please contact me, I would love to hear from you! - Elonka Dunin, St. Louis, Missouri

Who was Saint Raphael?

Joseph Kalinowski, born September 1, 1835 in Vilna, Poland (now Lithuania). He was a teacher of mathematics, engineer who helped design the Odessa/Kiev/Kursk portion of the Trans-Siberian railway, Minister of War, Siberian labor camp prisoner, royal tutor, and eventually ordained priest of the Discalced Carmelite order. He founded multiple Catholic organizations around Poland and the Ukraine, most prominent of which was a monastery in Wadowice, Poland. He died there in 1907, and 14 years later, Karol Wojtyła, aka Pope John Paul II, was born in the same town.

As a priest, Joseph Kalinowski took the name "Raphael of Saint Joseph". He was beatified by Pope John Paul in 1983, in Krakow, in front of a crowd of over two million people. In 1991, Pope John Paul declared his boyhood hero a Saint. Raphael was the first friar to have been canonized in the Order of the Discalced Carmelites, since co-founder Saint John of the Cross (1542-1591). For more information about his life, please check for the biographies in the Links section below.

Pictures

Image
(please click on the thumbnail to see a larger version)		 Description Source
Photo of Raphael Kalinowski's father, Andrew Kalinowski (1805-1878) Life and Spirituality
Joseph Kalinowski (Saint Raphael) as a young officer in the Russian Army (circa 1857) Life in Pictures
Kalinowski with his companions the Engineers (circa 1860) Life in Pictures
Joseph Kalinowski in Paris, approximately 1874 Joseph Kalinowski at the Hotel Lambert in Paris, where, after his return from Siberia, he served as tutor to Prince Augustus ("Gucio") Czartoryski in 1874 Life and Spirituality
Wadowice church and convent, built by Saint Raphael. Pictures show it from when it was built, and what it looked like in the 1980s. His Life in Pictures
Painting of Saint Raphael, from the Wadowice convent His Life in Pictures
A painting of Raffaele Kalinowski Vatican Website
Photo of Blessed Raphael Kalinowski, taken without his knowledge by Jules Mien on March 30th, 1897 in Krakow Father Raphael Kalinowski of St. Joseph, March 30, 1897 Life and Spirituality
Wadowice. On November 15th 1907 the Blessed died and his venerable remains were exposed in the Chapel of the Immaculate for the devotion of the faithful. On the 19th his body was taken to Czerna for burial in the convent cemetery. His Life in Pictures
Czerna. Conventual cemetery where the Blessed was buried in 1907. His grave soon became a place of pilgrimage; the devotion of the faithful led them to remove flowers and earth to take home so that they had to be periodically renewed. His Life in Pictures
Wadowice. Pope John Paul II's birthplace. His Life in Pictures
Czerna. In 1936, in the course of the Informative Process of Beatification, the body of the Blessed was exhumed and deposited in the Chapel of St. John of the Cross, which became a place of continual pilgrimage by the faithful. On the wall can be seen how the plaster has been broken away by the faithful, in order to carry it off for relics. His Life in Pictures
Pope John Paul II in the Apostolic Palace in 1980, at the Promulgation of the Decree on the heroicity of the virtues of Father Raphael Kalinowski His Life in Pictures
Pope John Paul II in the Apostolic Palace at the Vatican City, for the 1983 Promulgation of the Decree approving the miracle for the beatification of Raphael Kalinowski. His Life in Pictures

Saint Raphael Factoids

The current resting place of Saint Raphael, in Czerna

Links with more information about Saint Raphael Kalinowski

Information in other languages