A startling incident occurred inside a Winnipeg Polish Catholic church when a man wielding a knife attacked a priest. The moment was captured in a shocking 50-second video taken from the service's livestream.
According to Winnipeg Police Service spokeswoman Const. Dani McKinnon, there was no apparent trigger for the attempted attack on the 38-year-old priest, which occurred around 6 p.m.
The priest sustained no injuries.
50-year-old Pawel Olownia has been with assault with a weapon and possession of a weapon, as well as other charges.
“The pastor [sic] let the police know that he did not recognize this individual who had come on the stage,” Winnipeg police spokesperson Stephen Spencer told CityNews.
The event is part of a growing pattern of troubling violent incidents affecting urban places of worship.
“The pastor was able to see what was happening, whether he saw the knife in his hand or just had a sense that something wasn’t right, was able to get off the … alter fast enough,” Spencer said.
“If he was really motivated, it could have been a lot worse. The fact that he made the attempt to assault the pastor then got rid of the knife and just sat down, was the best case of a worst case scenario that somebody would face. It could have been a lot worse. Luckily, nobody got hurt.”
“It doesn’t sound like it was a targeted attack at all. It really sounded like it was just a random incident. Very rare, but quite random,” Spencer said.
“Something like this, the motivation can be really hard to know.”
