Fr Andrew Fornal OP should have a better idea than most how large the earth is. A member of the Dominican Fathers, he was born in south-east Poland, moved to Melbourne as a young priest, then spent a decade in one of the world’s biggest and busiest cities, New York, before returning to Australia, to St Joseph’s Parish, Kingswood, where he has been for 13 years.
But instead, all these moves have shown him the opposite: how similar people are and how small the world is.
“One day you are in Melbourne and the next day you are in New York and there are people in both places who are waiting for you to minister to them, to lead them to faith, to lead them to Christ and to proclaim the truth,” Fr Andrew says.
“In that moment the world shrunk, and it shrunk even more when I came from New York back to Melbourne for a visit,” he says.
‘There is work to be done’
Growing up in Communist-controlled Poland in the 1970s and ‘80s was not an easy time to be Catholic. But Fr Andrew remembers the Church was still very much “the centre of our lives and the beacon of freedom”, thanks largely to the leadership of senior church figures such as Blessed Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński, the Primate of Poland, and Cardinal Karol Wojtyła, who was later to become Pope St John Paul II.
Fr Andrew Fornal OP during the 2016 World Youth Day in Kraków, Poland. Image: Diocese of Parramatta
He attended Mass at a nearby Dominican Priory during these years, eventually becoming an altar server. By high school, he had decided to enter the Dominican Order and become a priest. So after finishing school, he joined the novitiate for a year before embarking on six years of study for the priesthood.
He had only been ordained a few years when his Provincial asked if he would go to Australia to become a chaplain for the Polish community in Melbourne’s western suburbs. He remembers that it was a tough decision to leave Poland and everything he knew.
Eventually, he told his Provincial: “If you want me to go, I will go because there is work to be done there. So I said ‘Yes’.
“I arrived on 2 April 1998, in Melbourne, and it was a shock, with the distances, with everything, the life in Poland was totally different,” he says.
Fr Andrew Fornal OP outside the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe in Mexico City during the 2019 Diocese of Parramatta World Youth Day pilgrimage to Panama. Image: Diocese of Parramatta
During those early months, he missed Poland and his old life. He remembers, “It was a difficult time – to adjust, to find my way there”. But all that changed when, two years later, he again was asked to move, this time to a parish in the Bronx, in New York, to help with a new mission for the Dominican Province.
“When I went to New York, I didn’t miss Poland, I missed Australia. And then I realised that the world is small.”
He was to move again a few years later when the Archdiocese of New York asked the Dominicans to take over the Campus Ministry at Columbia University, and Fr Andrew became “the youngest Parish Priest in Manhattan,” at 32.
It was during his eight years at Columbia University that then-Bishop of Parramatta Anthony Fisher OP visited and planted the seed of a return to Australia. So when Fr Andrew’s time at Columbia had ended and he had finished visiting friends in Melbourne, Bishop Fisher asked if he and his community would help with the Campus Ministry at Western Sydney University; some time later they were then asked to take over the running of St Joseph’s Parish.
Living the truth of Jesus
The 13 years that Fr Andrew and his fellow Dominican priests – Fr Pawel Barszczewski OP and Fr Piotr Kruk OP – have been at Kingswood has seen the parish grow with many young families, professionals and hospital workers, especially from the Philippines and India. Because of this growth, especially among the Indian diaspora, they were approached by the Syro-Malabar community to hold Mass in the church on Sundays, and this “cooperation is working very well for the parish”, Fr Andrew says.
Parish Priest Fr Andrew Fornal OP greets young parishioners following Mass on Easter Sunday at St Joseph’s Parish, Kingswood on Sunday 31 March 2024. Image: Alphonsus Fok/Diocese of Parramatta
He says the Dominican charism is to live the truth of Jesus Christ and to bring others to this truth through the Gospels. One important way they are doing this in the parish is through their sacramental program, including first confession, first communion and confirmation. It is rigorous and involves many weekly sessions – 14 weeks for confirmation.
“We want this to be a serious preparation for people who receive those sacraments,” he says.
One of the first things Fr Andrew did when he took over the parish was to renovate the church – a former school run by the Josephite Sisters – into a permanent place of worship with an altar at the back. Now with a growing congregation the old classroom-church is getting too small and Fr Andrew has a dream of one day building a larger church that is fit-for-purpose.
Easter Sunday Mass at St Joseph’s Parish, Kingswood on Sunday 31 March 2024. Image: Diocese of Parramatta
“If we had a generous donor who could give us few million dollars, I would gladly accept and build a beautiful church here,” he says. “But we need to do whatever we can with the means we have.”
His hope is that as the congregation grows this will enable the parish to slowly build up the funds necessary. In the meantime, he is also praying hard. “The Lord listens and the Lord provides,” he says.
This article was originally published in the 2025 Season of Creation | Spring edition of the Catholic Outlook Magazine. You can read the digital version here or pick up a copy in your local parish.
