Interview with Father Krzysztof Dworak CSsR, director of the Redemptorist Spirituality Center in Rome.
Father Krzysztof Dworak CSsR, the new director of the Center for Redemptorist Spirituality at the General Curia in Rome, shares his experiences, visions, and plans for the future of the Center in an interview with Scala News.
A few months ago, you arrived in Rome to prepare to direct the Redemptorist Spirituality Center at the General Curia. You became the Director of the Redemptorist Spirituality last July. How do you feel about this new role?
First of all, I am grateful for the invitation to this type of mission in the Congregation, which I had never considered before. It was not easy for me to accept this challenge, given my age, my education, and the need to be fluent in English, Italian, and Spanish. I am aware that this assignment will require an even greater personal immersion in the spirituality and understanding of the Congregation’s mission, both at the beginning and now, as our Congregation is undergoing a restructuring process to better respond to the challenges of today’s secularized and indifferent world. Looking at all this, one seems so small and limited in the face of such an important mission. The words of Saint Paul are a consolation: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor 12:9). I have great confidence in this.
You have gained extensive experience in missionary service in various countries. How will this be useful to you in your current mission?
Every country I’ve spent a long time in—Poland, Brazil, Portugal, and now Italy—has become part of my life and my Redemptorist mission. I’ve sought to understand the local culture, language, customs, socio-political system, piety, and the way people live their faith. Every place, every time spent, every mission, every parish, every book read, every retreat and encounter, every experience, even negative ones, seen from the perspective of faith, enriches a person. I hope that these diverse experiences, enriched by those of each team member, will help us become together, in the present world, missionaries of hope, following in the footsteps of Christ the Redeemer.
The Redemptorist Spirituality Center is known for organizing annual spirituality courses, which give members the opportunity to experience firsthand the places where the first Redemptorists lived and worked. What else is included in the Center’s activities?
Next year, we will thank God for 25 years of spirituality courses, which have contributed and continue to contribute to the deepening of Alphonsian and Redemptorist spirituality, not only among the confreres themselves, but also within our broader Redemptorist Family. In addition to courses and pilgrimages to the places and sources of our spirituality, the Spirituality Center prepares various materials to contribute to the growth of spirituality and the deepening of our mission in the Church and in the places where we are present. One aspect of the Spirituality Center’s collaboration with the various Provinces is the promotion of meetings, retreats, and reflections, according to the needs and guidelines of the General Council and the Provinces themselves.
What is the vision for the Spirituality Center’s activities in the coming years?
We will certainly continue to organize spirituality courses here in Rome and in Ciorani, from where we will travel to other places so important to the Congregation and to every Redemptorist: Ciorani, Sant’Agata dei Goti, Scala, Naples, and Marianella, Muro Lucano and Deliceto, Materdomini and Pagani. I believe this is a significant challenge for every Redemptorist: to feel the spirit of the Congregation in the places where it was founded. No other course can replace this unique experience of being at the origins of our Congregation’s history, of being at the source. I think a similar training opportunity, perhaps in the form of a pilgrimage, could be offered to our lay associates, who are the strength of our Redemptorist family. I believe that retreats, meetings, and seminars in these very places, organized for them and for the young people in our pastoral ministries, could greatly contribute to deepening their knowledge of our Shrine of Perpetual Help in Rome, as well as of our great saints and blesseds.
The Spirituality Center’s concrete projects and commitments certainly require the collaboration of many people. Who can you count on for your ministry?
One of the elements of Redemptorist spirituality is openness to community. This is an indispensable aspect of our missionary commitment. Therefore, I can certainly count on the current team, which includes confreres from different provinces and from different parts of the world. I believe they can also count on the interest of fellow students and professors at our Collegio Maggiore. I also count on good collaboration with the confreres of the secretariats of the various provinces, responsible for supporting our spirituality. I will contact them and invite them to work together.
Thank you very much and best wishes for your new mission!
The interview with Fr. Grzegorz Ruszaj CSsR / Scala News
Palm Sunday in the parish of Damaia, Lisbon. 
From left: Mons. Mychajlo Bubnij CSsR, p. Krzysztof Dworak CSsR, Card. Mykola Bychok CSsR (Rome, 2025).
Biography of Fr. Krzysztof Dworak CSsR
Father Krzysztof Dworak, CSsR, was born in 1960 in Piława Górna, Poland. In 1979, he entered the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer and made his religious profession two years later. After three years of studies at the Redemptorist Major Seminary in Tuchow, he left for Brazil in 1984 to continue his formation at the newly founded Redemptorist Major Seminary in Salvador, Bahia. After his priestly ordination in 1988, he worked as a missionary and then in parish ministry in Brazil and, since 2016, in Portugal, as parish priest in Damaia, a suburb of Lisbon. Since July 2025, he has been the director of the Redemptorist Spirituality Center in Rome.
Academic training
- Studies and formation at the Redemptorist Major Seminary in Tuchow, Poland, then at the Redemptorist Major Seminary in Salvador BA, Brazil.
- Licentiate in Systematic Theology with specialization in Liturgy from the Faculty of Theology of Nossa Senhora da Assunção, São Paulo (2004).
- Doctorate in Religious Sciences at the Pontifical Catholic University (PUC) of São Paulo (2014).
Mission experience
- Brazil (1988-2015): missionary and director of the popular missions group, responsible for the liturgy of the Sanctuary of the Good Jesus in Bom Jesus da Lapa, vicar of the parish of Senhor do Bonfim, parish priest of the parish of Nossa Senhora da Piedade in Itabuna, vicar of the parish of Resurrection in Ondina and of the church of San Lazzaro in Salvador.
- Portugal (2016-2025): vicar and then parish priest of the Parish of the Most Holy Redeemer in Damaia, on the outskirts of Lisbon.
Academic and training commitment
- Member of the Association of Liturgists of Brazil (ASLI), of which he was president for two years.
- Member of the GEPERCS scientific group of the University of Bahia.
- He collaborated with the Faculty of Religious Sciences of the Lusophone University in Lisbon as a visiting professor.
Current responsibilities:
Director of the Redemptorist Spirituality Center from July 5, 2025.
