“The World is on Fire: Fleeing to Freedom or Survival ” Symposium in Poland

The Human Rights and a Just Society is a symposium hosted and organized yearly in cooperation with the John Felice Rome Center of Loyola University Chicago, Loyola’s Polish Studies Program, and Nicholas Copernicus University of Torun, Poland. The tenth symposium will be held in on Oct. 11-12. This year’s theme is “The World is on Fire: Fleeing to Freedom or Survival.”

Focusing this year on the thousands of migrants who are escaping each month from their unsafe homelands towards Europe, it asks us to become change agents, to help solve this problem. It’s likely that Jan Karski would have sympathized with this cause because it is focused on people who are in the midst of crisis, like those he warned the West about during World War II. 

There’s an obvious parallel to the Jews trying to escape Nazi persecution -- who needed a place of refuge and safety. But even in today’s world, about 1.2 million in Ukraine have been displaced by war, 3 million people have fled Syria, and hundreds of thousands have left areas occupied by ISIS in the Middle East and Boko Haram in Africa. According to the Washington Post, it’s thought to be the largest wave of migrants since World War II.

It’s not a new problem, but one needing solutions with increasing urgency.

The HRJC will meet in the historic city of Torun, and participants will engage in a program that is especially relevant in today’s world: European migration and the related refugee crisis.  Included in this year’s speakers is a young man who emigrated from Afghanistan.  He will tell his story along with presentations from our Loyola’s faculty, including JKEF director Bozena Nowicka McLees and JKEF supporter John Kurowski.

For more information, see the attached flyer at the bottom of this article or view the conference video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlIIZnhU9JI&feature=youtu.be or see Twitter https://twitter.com/HumanR8sJustSoc or Facebook https://www.facebook.com/HumanRightsandJustSociety.hrjs-symposium-2015-program.pdf

www.jankarski.net