Poland's Archbishop Wielgus a former communist spy?

Radio Polonia ^ | Dec 20, 2006 | Joanna Najfeld

[JoAnka]

According to the weekly Gazeta Polska, Archbishop Stanisław Wielgus, who is to succeed Cardinal Józef Glemp as the metropolitan of Warsaw, has in the past been a secret collaborator of the communist intelligence.

Investigative journalists from the Gazeta Polska weekly have found documents from the communist archives, according to which the newly appointed archbishop metropolitan of Warsaw, Stanisław Wielgus, collaborated with the communist secret services for over 20 years, informing them about the activities of the Catholic Church in Communist Poland.

Tomasz Sakiewicz, editor in chief of Gazeta Polska:

'Our authors have found materials from the archives of Communist secret police which show us that Bishop Wielgus was a secret collaborator of secret communist intelligence. We are very sure that these materials are true. His cooperation lasted for 22 years. He was one of the most important collaborators of the communist intelligence in the Church.'

Lately archbishop Stanisław Wielgus has been known as a vocal opponent of revealing former communist spies in the present Polish public life. Now he denies the accusations against himself. He says he kept in contact with communist era secret service but never actively collaborated against the Church. He also claims that the documents produced are fake.

According to Gazeta Polska Archbishop Wielgus was one of the most important communist spies in the Catholic Church. He is supposed to have started collaboration back in the 1960s and worked initially for the department dedicated to destroying the Catholic Church. Allegedly, he agreed to cooperation with the communist services in exchange for an opportunity to pursue his scientific career abroad.

Gazeta Polska writes that the archbishop's cooperation went uninterrupted until the beginning of the 1990s when the communist services ceased to exist. He never changed his mind about what he was doing, even after a series of brutal murders by the communist regime on priests, says Gazeta Polska.

Independent investigative journalist Leszek Szymowski has written on communist crimes, also those dealing with the Catholic Church:

'Communism used priests as very important sources of information. They informed about everything that happened in the Catholic organizations and in the Catholic Church. The communist government used them to fight against the Catholic Church. Information gained from the priests was used to enforce the actions of intimidation of the Catholic hierarchy and to discourage Poles from being Catholic. What is also important is that the historians discovered that Polish priests were also used as spies in a very serious plot of KGB against John Paul II.'

The activity of communist spies among the clergy helped the communist services perpetrate most horrendous crimes, such as the brutal murder of Fr. Jerzy Popiełuszko, continues Szymowski:

'Fr. Jerzy Popiełuszko of Warsaw’s Żoliborz district, a priest of 'Solidarity', was murdered in 1984. Before that he was being spied on. One of the most important spies was Fr. Michał Czajkowski who was later one of the most popular Polish priests and one of the big authorities in Poland.'

It is of grave importance for Poles to find out the truth about the country's Communist past, as these questions heavily influence Poland's present, says philosopher Tomasz Terlikowski of Newsweek Polska:

'Which of the priests gave in to the pressure and collaborated with the communist intelligence? This question about the past has a very real impact on Poland's present. Today we are facing this issue: can a person who collaborated with the regime be the moral and theological authority for a whole diocese? From what we learned about archbishop Wielgus, his collaboration might have meant as many as 20 years of informing the communist regime about what was happening in the Church. And the main aim of the Communists was the destruction of the Church. '

If the vetting process had been done just after the fall of Communism in the early 1990s, we wouldn't have a major public opinion scandal every several weeks now, argues Terlikowski:

'The consequences of neglecting the vetting process are very serious. Church hierarchy loses credibility in the eyes of some believers. You can have the impression that most priests collaborated with the Communists when in fact only a small number of them did.'

It is not the first time that Gazeta Polska has written on Communist agents present in Polish present public life. Recently, they have published information on Milan Subotic, a former communist collaborator, who has been an influential figure in one of Poland's biggest commercial television stations, TVN.

Gazeta Polska's editor in chief, Tomasz Sakiewicz, again:

'It's our mission. Journalists should show people the truth. The truth about Poland is that we were occupied by the Soviets and their communist cooperators. Most dangerous collaborators were the secret collaborators, because now they are still active in our public life, some of them cooperate with Russian intelligence. They are still dangerous for our country. I am very sure that people should know the truth. Just like after the second world war, Germans should know the Nazi cooperators, we should know who were the communist cooperators.'

The Institute of National Remembrance has not commented on the findings of Gazeta Polska.

[JoAnka]

Qualify for a ping?

[lizol]

Eastern European ping list

---

FRmail me to be added or removed from this Eastern European ping list

[lizol]

Ping

[pgkdan]

Are there any Freepers who can comment on the credibility of this source? This is terrible if true.

[JoAnka]

Sadly, there are more of them still uncloaked among the Polish clergy. Read more on this here:

http://www.polskieradio.pl/polonia/article.asp?tId=43062&j=2

That book is supressed. Some people don't want it out, as it would soon turn out that many liberal Catholic priests in this country have a not so liberty-loving past behind them.

[GSlob]

Why terrible? By their very nature, the kegebuns had to be present in EVERY walk of life, in their attempts to exert TOTAL control [hence "total"itarian]. The church could not be, and was not, exempted, and thus needs a major decommunization cleaning as much as every other place.

[lizol]

Yes, this is.

I have very mixed feelings about this.

I hope, that - if those facts were supposed to be true - Bishop Wilegus wouldn't have accepted the new post (as he knows his own past).

On the other hand - "Gazeta Polska" is a conservative weekly, and they are not anti-Church definitely.

They wouldn't attack just for fun, to humiliate the bishop.

I don't know, we'll have to wait some time, until "Gazeta Polska" shows the evidence, the documents from the communist secret police archives (if they have any).

[JoAnka]

Exactly. I would say the church was especially targeted as the party wanted to destroy it, also from within. The Church was a haven of freedom and that was a problem for communism. They (the commies) even had a special department dedicated to destroying the Church.

[GSlob]

Coming from the USSR of accursed memory, I am perfectly familiar with the mindset.

[Lukasz]

I read that Vatican support him but what they really know about this case? Rather nothing...

[JoAnka]

We should have a special committee set to investigate those cases looking at the facts. The verdict should leave no room for doubt, suspicion or denial, this way or the other. Plus, this should have been done years ago.

[bd476]

JoAnka wrote: "Exactly. I would say the church was especially targeted as the party wanted to destroy it, also from within. The Church was a haven of freedom and that was a problem for communism. They (the commies) even had a special department dedicated to destroying the Church."

With today's latest news Ties to Communist Secret Police Snare Polish Bishop I wonder if it is possible that Bishop Wielgus was caught in between a rock and a hard place.

Perhaps the Sluzba Bezpieczenstwa forced the many meetings and then threatened him if he didn't show up. /holding out hope