Polish settlement in the Philippines began during the Spanish colonial period, mostly with the arrival of Catholic clergy destined for missionary work in other Asian countries.
In 1642, Męciński arrived in Manila from Vietnam along with a large group of fellow Jesuits, where they were greeted by Governor-General Sebastián Hurtado de Corcuera.
Męciński stayed in Manila for a few months before he was deployed on his second visit to Japan, where he was martyred in Nagasaki on March 23, 1643.
[2] The second Pole to arrive in the Philippines was another Jesuit missionary, Jan Chryzostom Bąkowski from Częstochowa.
Aside from Bąkowski, several Polish Catholic clergy have also stayed in the Philippines, including Władysław Michał Zaleski, who served as papal delegate to the East Indies from 1886 to 1916, and Józef Wiśniewski, who served as a missionary in the Philippines prior to becoming a chaplain in the Polish Army, where he was arrested by the Germans in 1940 and died at the Dachau concentration camp.