The Coalition of Polish Americans 1st Annual Convention in Chicago

On October 20-21 the Coalition of Polish Americans held its first Annual Convention in Chicago. Saturday October 20 was devoted to discussion of internal matters. On Sunday October 21,2018 the Coalition of Polish Americans met in Chicago with representatives of local Polish-community. The meeting was preceded by attendance at the Mass at the Holy Trinity Church on 118 N. Noble Street. At the Mass attendees had a chance to witness a special event: the introduction of the relics of two Polish martyrs that were killed for their faith in Peru, Blessed Michal Tomaszek and Blessed Zbigniew Strzalkowski.

After the Mass the members of the Coalition were given a warm welcome by the pastor of the church and proceeded to meet with the local Polish-Americans and with the representatives of local Polish-American media. In the opening presentation the president of the Coalition Stanislaw Sliwowski discussed the core values and the main objectives of the Coalition. President Sliwowski was followed by Vice-president Wieslaw Golebiewski who described the unsatisfactory, and often criticized, state of relations between the Polish-Americans community and their Motherland. Mr. Golebiewski presented a vision of how to reform these relations so that Polish-Americans can use their potential to help Poland effectively present its positions in the United States, and particularly by creating effective ways
to communicate with the main Polish institutions, perhaps by allowing Polonia representation in the Polish Parliament so that it can address issues such as double taxation of American retirement payments in Poland.

Maria Szonert Binienda spoke about the weaknesses of the Polish-American community. She underlined that the 80 years of skewed teaching of Polish history because of Nazi and Soviet dominance over Poland and neglect of Polish governments to address the issue since
1989 have hampered the development of effective historical diplomacy and allowed outside forces to dominate the discussion of Polish history. She argued that the focus on domestic issues as well as weak international position prevent the current Polish government from addressing this issue effectively. Ms. Szonert Binienda suggested that this space should be filled by the Polish-American organizations who are not hampered by these constraints and should conduct historical diplomacy through series of historical conferences and by creating an effective form of information dissemination that would allow the Polish-Americans to get

through to the mainstream with the proper interpretation of Polish history.

The conference also addressed the issues of involvement and participation of Polish-Americans in their ethnic organizations and in the American society in general. Krzysztof Waz spoke about social background and history of the Polish-American organizations. Zbigniew Piwoni presented on his personal work with Polish youth and attempts to engage them to contribute to the Polish-American community by fostering connections to Poland. These presentations met with positive response from attendees from local Chicago Polonia who raised many questions and contributed to extensive discussion.

The Coalition of Polish Americans was founded on September 24, 2017 in Washington, D.C. The Coalition is an independent political and social organization that emphasizes traditional values and whose goal is to encourage wider involvement of the Polish-American community in the American public life. The Coalition promotes Polish-American engagement in social life of United States, and wants to define and represent the interests ofthe Polish-American community.