Application to the Ministry of Culture

Today the Foundation applied to obtain the financial support from the Polish Ministry of Culture to publish an illustrated book for children of age 8 to 12., entitled "How Michał from Lviv made it to China" and written by professor Monika Miazek-Męczyńska about the extraordinary person of Michał Boym, a Polish 17th century jesuit, born in the distinguished Lviv family of the Boyms (see the Boym Chapel), a son of Paweł Jerzy Boym - a Lviv city counsillor and its mayor as well as the court physician to the Polish King Sisigmund III the Old.

Father Michael Boym, a 17th century jesuit and a Christian missionary is an outstanding Pole who made a very important contribution to the history of the world being one of the very first people who built bridges of understanding between Western civilization and that of the Far East. In particular he played a very special role in the process of spreading Christian religion in East Asia. For Western civilization Father Michael Boym stands out as one of the founders of the Western knowledge about ancient and 17th century imperial China, an ingenious discoverer, ethnographer and a cultural researcher, botanist and a zoologist, whose works gave an impulse to the development of the whole branch of science – the Chinese Studies.