It’s that time of year: “koliada!” In our neck of the woods, carolers from various organizations visit the homes (and some offices) of their members and supporters with Christmas carols and best wishes for the New Year. For many, this koliada is a major fund-raiser that goes a long way in helping to sustain their activity. Some organizations, like the Ukrainian Congress Committee of America and The Ukrainian Museum, do their koliada by mail; still others, including the Ukrainian World Congress, opt for e-mail.
The Ukrainian National Association, which publishes our community’s two most important newspapers, The Ukrainian Weekly and our Ukrainian-language sister publication Svoboda, sends out Christmas cards to raise funds for the Ukrainian National Foundation (UNF), an affiliated company of the UNA that performs charitable activities on its behalf. This year, the cards feature the beautiful work of artists Iryna Korchuk and Volodymyr Petryshyn from Ukraine. Proceeds from sales of the cards go to the UNF, a registered 501(c)(3) charitable organization, and additional donations are encouraged toward the UNA Publications Endowment Fund and Soyuzivka Heritage Center, as well as the UNF’s general fund, so they may continue their worthy missions in our community. (The 2019 Christmas Card project was introduced to readers in our November 24, 2019, edition.)
We’re grateful to the UNA and the UNF for their attention this year to the recently established UNA Publications Endowment Fund, which aims to ensure and safeguard the future of publications of the Ukrainian National Association. As noted in the November 10, 2019, report on the fund’s launch, our newspapers “have a long history of promoting the interests of Ukraine and Ukrainians through the written word” and now do so not only in print, but also digitally via their websites.
We hereby humbly ask our readers and subscribers to welcome us into your homes as koliadnyky and to help buttress our endeavors by contributing to the UNA Publications Endowment Fund, which is geared to securing this newspaper’s future, as well as to The Ukrainian Weekly Press Fund, which assists our ongoing day-to-day operations. At the same time, we must emphasize that what we most appreciate is your support in the form of subscriptions and gift subscriptions. Please share with your family, friends and colleagues the importance of subscriptions, which make this newspaper possible. (It may be hard to believe, but we have found that many use our newspaper when they need it to promote an event or cause, yet they are not subscribers!) After all, without subscribers, there would be no paper. And, if you value our community, then you should also value its most important vehicles of communication and networking.
As we begin 2020, a new year and a new decade, we offer sincere thanks to all who have backed and endorsed our work with their subscriptions and donations during 2019. With your patronage, we hope to continue our mission of keeping our Ukrainian community members in touch and of informing the world about Ukraine and Ukrainians. We wish all of you all the best in 2020 and beyond!