Women and Children in Serbia are Starving as Result of War
Representative of Serbian Church in United States Says Conditions Among the Helpless Are Deplorable and Asks Aid; Federal Council of Churches to Renew Efforts For World Peace
Rev. Sebastian Dabovich who is at the head of the Serbian Orthodox church in this country, representing here the archbishop of Belgrade, reports terrible suffering by women and children throughout Serbia. Three wars in three years have dried up benevolence. Orphanages founded to care for children left from earlier wars are declared by him to be without food supplies. These orphanages include one founded by princess Helena and the wife of the Russian ambassador at Belgrade. The children of small trades people, with parents at war, are starving.
The Serbian church in Serbia, and congregations of it in the United States, are organically independent of the Russian church, but closely allied with it. Its form of service is the same. Serbian congregations exist in New York, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Chicago, throughout some parts of the northwest and in San Francisco. Many male members of them volunteering to go back to Serbia to fight, have been unable to secure passage. They are forming relief societies, both men and women leading, but pastor Dabovich states that Serbians here are unable to contribute all relief needed. Americans must come to their aid if they are not to die.
Pastor Dabovich makes the point that the eastern church is often charged with over-conservatism, and lack of all the spiritual care that it ought to exercise. Now he much desires that his church act quickly. Bishop Vincentius of Uskub, bishop Barnabas of Debar, both in historic Macedonia, bishop Dositheus of Nish, and archbishop Metrophanes, primate of Montenegro, report terrible sufferings and appeal through pastor Dabovich for assistance. The headquarters of the Serbian church in this country are, by courtesy during the war, at the Russian cathedral of St. Nicholas, in New York.1
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Publisher’s Note: This article was originally published in El Paso Herald, Week-End Edition, August 29-30, 1914, p. 3.