Posted on 01/17/2013 6:39:14 AM PST by marshmallow
(Reuters) - A Polish court has rejected a motion calling for the removal of a crucifix from parliament's debating chamber in a case pitting Poland's traditional Catholicism against a younger generation who think the church is too strong.
Warsaw's district court late on Monday argued that since the cross had not been met with any objections in the past it was accepted by most Poles and did not violate their rights.
The crucifix was placed in the chamber one night by two conservative politicians in 1997.
The court also chastised the anti-clerical Palikot's Movement party led by former vodka tycoon Janusz Palikot which brought the court case, accusing it of calling for tolerance yet failing to show acceptance of religious symbols.
The party has tapped Poland's growing secularization to become the country's third-largest political force. It said it would appeal the decision.
"The court failed to show objectivity in its decision," said Andrzej Rozenek, one of the party's parliamentary deputies.
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
Obviously descriminating against vampires is a good thing in Poland. The UN should get involved.
Good for them! There’s no reasonable argument for removing it. If the younger generation is complaining just tell them to chalk it up to being a “historical” item.
This is a bit troubling.
If Poland goes “secular,” IMO it’s over; Antichrist wins.
In all seriousness...
IMO, I can understand why they want to remove it. The Catholic cross, IMO, is quite gross.
A cross on the wall is a religious symbol. A dead body on the wall is disturbing. And I wouldn’t want to have to stare at that every day either.
So if some there are not Catholic I can understand why they want it removed. They should compromise and switch it with just a regular cross.
That way, to the Catholic and Protestants it would be a religious symbol and to the non-believer it’s just a decoration and everyone’s happy.
this is not Spanish/Iberian style which is bloody
Note also that the article is not complete -- they want to remove a cross, even a basic, simple cross.
this guy Palikot is basically a demagogue like Obama -- one of his posters was "0% unemployment today" -- and has led movements against capitalism
It's also been key in recent debates striking down moves to liberalize abortion
Sorry, MeontheBeach, but you are talking through your hat. I live here in Poland, in Warsaw, -- for the past two years, so I can tell you this from my experience -- there are few to no non-Catholic Christians in Poland
The next largest Christian group is the Orthodox and they too have the image of the dead Christ on the crucifix -- of course this is an icon, not a 3d image
The next largest non-Catholic Christian denomination are the Lutherans (4000 people in all of Poland) and they have crucifixes too like this one
Besides these Christian groups the next group are the Jehovah's Witnesses - yup, no Crucifixes there, but they are a few thousand at the most
So, to sum up -- the non-Catholic groups are Lutherans and Orthodox mainly, both of whom have crucifixes with a dead body of Christ on them
There is no enthusiasm for Pentecostalism or Baptists or other Evangelicals. The Calvinists suffer from bad history (members of that group basically betrayed the country in the 1600's to the Swedes unlike the Lutherans who remained true to the country).
The only people objecting to the cross are anti-Christians. These are not really atheists, more hedonists
I've only met one ex-atheist in Poland, and that guy is now a devout Catholic working full-time to prevent abortion "liberalization".
Poland is not like the US or the UK. There are next to no "Protestants" here -- it's just not known. People are Catholic or Eastern Catholic or Orthodox or some are Lutheran
I lived near the Lutheran Church above (its close to Plac Piłsudski on plac Małachoswkiego)
the interior of the Church, with a crucifix, Mass etc. is pretty darn similar to a Catholic one.
There is no Catholic - "Protestant" conflict like in the US -- the Lutherans are well respected and the Orthodox are too (as long as they are not pro-Russian!, which none of the present-day Polish Orthodox are -- to give you a brief reason, Poland with Lithuania once included Belarus and Western Ukraine -- together that is Ruthenia. These people were Orthodox. Until 1600s this didn't cause any problems. The Catholics were 60% of the population, but the Polish-Lithuanian commonwealth gave freedom of religion, so there was no Protestant-Catholic war like in Germany. Calvinists, Lutherans even Unitarians (Polish Brethren) could freely practise and preach. The counter-reformation was peaceful. There were a few converted back, but the Protestant movement was not successful largely as it was perceived as a German movement or Czech movement. But the religions lived pretty well together. Then in the 1500s, Moscow portrayed itself as the protector of the Orthodox and said that it had a divine mission to gather the Orthodox. This caused a problem because of the Ruthenians. Most didn't want to join Moscowy as they preferred the democracy of the P-L commonwealth. But Muscowy pressed on and got stronger. Then, in the 1600s the Swedes invaded and devastated the country. They were aided by the Calvinists, which forever condemned Calvinism as anti-national) and at the same time Muscowy invaded. Over the next 100 years Russia grabbed large parts of Poland and forcibly Russified many peoples.
For most Lutherans in Poland, they have crucifixes themsevles so the Cross is not a piece of shame for them
Finally, note that the compromise you ask for is with some small minority of anti-religious folks, not "Protestants". It's like a compromise to allow gay marriage
A replacement for the crucifix with an icon is religiously ok -- 
The above is the main Catholic Cathedral in London -- the Westminister Cathedral
Or even a plain crucifix is ok -- this is the parish where I got married in, it's in Warsaw again
But what is at play here is more political -- the ones asking for the crucifix to go don't want even the plain cross...
no worries — we too often look at things from the prism of where we are at<
In Central and Eastern Europe Evangelical means Calvinists and lutherans -- Lutherans being Evangelical-Augusburg and Calvinists being Evangelical-Reformed
Oh, and I erred -- there is also a tiny community of Methodists in Poland, only in Warsaw -- they have a church on the second floor of an apartment block. They are about a few hundred
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