Missionary shares her story of conversion and gives advice on sharing the gospel with others
FAIRCHILD, Wis. — “I’m convinced that people are no longer able to hear dry Gospel words that just come out of our mouth without us allowing God to penetrate everything deeply,” said Ukrainian-born Catholic missionary Valentyna Pavsyukova. “It is not possible. People are too thirsty.”
Pavsyukova is the founder of Chalice of Mercy, a Catholic mission group serving the spiritual and material needs of the people of Ukraine based out of Wisconsin. She currently lives in Fairchild, Wis., but has spent the last 15 years leading medical and spiritual missions to Ukraine.
Last week, we ran an article about Pavsyukova’s medical missions to the war-torn country of Ukraine. This week, we are focusing on Pavsyukova’s own story and on the type of advice she has for sharing the gospel with others.
Valentyna’s story
“I am from Ukraine originally,” said Valentyna Pavsyukova. “I was born in Ukraine, and when I was 18 years old, I had moved to the United States of America. This is where my conversion actually happened. Here, in America.”
With the expression of religion suppressed by her government, Pavsyukova grew up with very little religious upbringing.
“I was Baptized as a child during the time of the Soviet Union,” she said. “It was very dangerous, but my parents still decided to do this. Everybody was practically doing this, not for reasons of faith, but because it was tradition.”
Her grandmother had grown up an orphan but had learned the “Our Father” from her grandmother. And so, the prayer was transmitted from grandmother to granddaughter across four generations.
“[My grandmother] felt that she had to teach me [the ‘Our Father’] just in case God exists,” said Pavsyukova. “She said to me, ‘When it’s going to be very difficult in your life, you remember this prayer and pray it in case God exists. He will help you.’”
In 2002, when she was 18 years old, Pavsyukova moved to the United States.
“That is when the difficult time came,” she said. “It was right in front of me. I remembered how my grandmother had taught me to pray this prayer. From that time on in my life, there is no doubt about the mega love that God the Father has for each one of us. Because of what I have experienced from Him, I am sure He wants to share with everybody.”
Her search
Upon discovering the power and love of God in this prayer, Pavsyukova went on a search.
“I wanted to search for where my place is because I wanted to go to the Church,” she said.
Her exposure to Catholicism was limited to old movies she’d watched to learn English, but she felt mesmerized by the presentation of Catholicism in film.
“I was living in Marshfield at the time and was driving every single day to work past St. John the Baptist Catholic Church, and I never had the strength to walk in because I still felt unworthy to enter inside those doors,” she said.
It wasn’t until she moved to Chippewa Falls, Wis., that she finally found the courage to step inside a Catholic church. She attended Mass for the first time, and “I saw what this man was doing at the table [and] thought what he is doing there — I have no idea — but whatever he is doing, I’m convinced, this is the truth, and I’m not going to move an inch from this table. It’s not possible. Never.”
She was initiated into the Catholic Church at the Easter Vigil in 2007 and founded Chalice of Mercy later that year.
“September 14, 2007,” she said. “It was the day of the exaltation of the Holy Cross. Very important feast and has such significance to me.”
Find your love story
After serving her mission for 15 years, she said, “I am just really convinced that God is working a love story in our life, through any mission he calls us to do. This is the love story with him primarily.”
And this gets back to her original point about the importance of not just speaking “dry gospel words.”
“People are too thirsty,” she said. “And within us, everything is so perfectly alert to the grace of God, that others — no matter who it is, and primarily I work with people who proclaim themselves atheists or agnostics or people who are just confused. This is my primary mission: to point out the One who is the giver of grace — our heavenly Father.
“But what a challenge it is,” she continued. “They do know when you tell them through your experience, from your heart or not, or if this is just something you’re saying. They are not ready for anything of this type. But what they are really ready for is ‘Show me how you are loved by God. Let me see this in you.’ Because a love story is very convincing. Everybody knows when you are in love. Everybody sees this, and that is the whole point of living the Gospel. There is no other.”
To learn more about Pavsyukova’s mission, Chalice of Mercy, and to donate, visit chaliceofmercy.org