Wheel at Full Circle for Catholic Relief : Charity: Fall of Soviet Union draws agency back to Europe, where its life began during World War II.

Half a century after it began as a relief agency for war-torn Europe, Catholic Relief Services finds itself right back where it started.

Nations formerly part of the now-disintegrated Soviet Union and their neighbors in Eastern Europe are among 72 countries getting food, shelter and medical and development aid from the international relief and development agency of the U.S. Catholic Church.

“Here was an agency that started off in the Second World War helping people in Europe and we’ve come full circle helping people in Europe,” said Alex Rondos, the charity’s director of congressional relations.

“We thought we would never have to do that again.”

The agency began as War Relief Services in 1943 and, after the war, served primarily the Third World. The breakup of the Soviet Union brought it into Europe again.

“It’s sort of tragic that it’s 1992 and we are still needed,” Rondos said. “We see ourselves being very busy in the years to come.”

The Baltimore-based organization, which will mark its 50th anniversary early with ceremonies in November, is one of the three largest private relief agencies in the United States, along with CARE and Worldvision, Rondos said.

Run by a board of 12 Catholic bishops from around the United States, it hands out aid solely on the basis of need.

About 40% of its $220-million budget for 1990 was in the form of food donated by the federal government. Private U.S. donations, federal reimbursements for the cost of shipping food overseas and cash government grants accounted for most of the rest.

Catholic Relief Services programs are currently up and running in Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, Austria and Croatia. The first food shipments into eastern Russia are expected to arrive in mid-April, said deputy executive director John Swenson.

Although the organization began by shipping tons of wheat and powdered milk across the Atlantic, its mission has changed.

“In the early years CRS, like other organizations, was primarily involved with large-scale distribution of food to people who were hungry,” Swenson said. “Our thinking has evolved. Rather than just provide food and medicine, we’ve come increasingly to support programs of development to help people help themselves.”

Many projects aim to leave behind a working program that can be carried on by the residents.

“Our business is to serve, not to control,” Rondos said. “We are not the new colonialists. We say to people, ‘What are your needs?’ ”