Internationally Known Humanitarian Deligiannis Named Waubonsee “Fab 40”

Internationally Known Humanitarian Deligiannis Named Waubonsee “Fab 40”

Sugar Grove — The fabric of society is held together by the combined small acts of everyday people working to make the world a better place. However, there are a handful of selfless, dynamic men and women who devote their lives to enacting significant global, regional and local change. Penny Panayiota Deligiannis is one of those rare individuals who can look at her incredible humanitarian accomplishments and see the tangible positive effect on literally thousands of lives around the globe. Waubonsee Community College is proud to honor her as one of the college?s “Fabulous 40” alumni.

This is a nice article about this woman's dedication to the people of Albania during that country's emergence from the fall of the communist state.

She began work with Archbishop Anastasios of Tirana and All Albania:

During this time and when she was still in graduate school, Deligiannis was also taking trips to east Africa to work on international development projects. It was here she met her mentor, His Beatitude Archbishop Anastasios of Tirana and All Albania. She would return to Africa, completing humanitarian projects in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania. Archbishop Anastasios eventually asked Deligiannis if she would take on a larger-scale project in Albania, closer to her ancestral homeland of Greece, working with the Orthodox Autocephalous Church of Albania. At this time, in the early and mid-1990s, Albania was a country still in the midst of transitioning from its decades-long communist rule to an open, democratic society. Deligiannis would serve a population that was 70 percent Muslim in a language she didn?t speak. Regardless, she decided to accept the challenge on the condition that when the organization was stable, she would be able to hand off her duties to an Albanian. Seven years later, and after overcoming numerous crises, her condition was met.

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