‘Through Their Eyes’: Ukraine Dialogue Showcases Journalists’ First-Hand Experience in Ukraine

Manor College’s 18th Ukraine Dialogue took place on April 24, 2025.

Manor College’s Ukraine Dialogue returned on Thursday, April 24. The 18th edition of the dialogue was titled, “Ukraine Through Our Eyes: Reflections from Journalists.”

The dialogue discussion featured two journalists who have made recent trips to Ukraine to document the war. They were Chris Herlinger, an award-winning international journalist and author who reports on global humanitarian crises, and Gina Christian, a national reporter for the Catholic wire service, OSV News.

Herlinger traveled throughout Eastern Europe for two years, where he says he saw some of the best and worst in humanity.

“A simple statement by a holocaust survivor I met at Auschwitz crystallized what I experienced in Ukraine,” Herlinger said. “They said, ‘Even if evil triumphs at times, goodness does not cease to exist.’”

Herlinger cited examples through his own eyes, including moments in convents, towns and villages across Ukraine both near and far from the fighting.

“Goodness can prevail,” he continued, “but it is also hard-earned.”

Christian took two trips to Ukraine with the Ukrainian Archbishop of the Archeparchy of Philadelphia Borys Gudziak in 2023 and 2024. A third trip scheduled for March 2025 was postponed following the decline in health from Pope Francis.

Christian first became interested in Ukraine in January 2022 when Manor College President Dr. Jonathan Peri released a Statement of Concern on behalf of the institution. After speaking with Archbishop Gudziak, Christian dove in head first.

Her trips to Ukraine showed her that this is not only a war of territory, but one of “the human mind, body and soul.”

“What I am presenting are some deeply formative experiences that have been a training for me in how to live, but not just live for myself, but to be a member of the church and human community,” Christian said. “I think that is what Ukraine is teaching us. I pray that we learn that lesson so that we can contribute to human flourishing by celebrating the fight for life and goodness in the face of truly genocidal, demonic evil.”

Ambassador Roman Popadiuk, the first United States Ambassador to Ukraine under President George H.W. Bush, moderated the event. The Ukraine Dialogue was sponsored by Ukrainian Selfreliance Federal Credit Union.