Jews Concerned by Move to End Church-state Separation in Poland

The Polish Catholic Church, which has lately sought to improve Catholic attitudes toward Jews, has called for an end to the separation of church and state in Poland.

Though the proposal is not considered likely to win majority support in the current parliament, the first fully democratic parliamentary elections in late October could give way to a more sympathetic legislature.

A formal move to make Poland a theocracy would cause some concern among American Jewish communal leaders, because it could challenge the status of Poland’s dwindling Jewish community, which numbers less than 10,000 out of an overwhelmingly Catholic population of 38 million.

But Jewish experts are also concerned that such a move could set a new political trend in Eastern Europe.

“Poland is a bellwether for the rest of Eastern Europe and Russia,” explained George Spectre, director of political education at B’nai B’rith International in Washington.

“Poland’s future as a Western-oriented state will hinge heavily on its willingness and ability to be pluralistic, even though it is overwhelmingly Polish Catholic,” he said.

“Poland must create an atmosphere where minorities can feel that they’re equal, not subsumed under an officially religious state,” he said.

The proposal to unify church and state is suspected to have the support of Poland’s staunchly Catholic president, Lech Walesa.

BISHOP BACKS THE SEPARATION

“Without Walesa’s okay, I’m not sure this would be happening,” said one observer, adding that former Prime Minister Tadeusz Mazowiecki, who ran against Walesa, “would have used all of his influence to defeat it.”

The Polish Episcopate first introduced the notion of the church as state a year ago, and brought it up again several days ago, according to Bronislaw Geremek, the parliamentary leader of the Solidarity bloc, who spoke by telephone with Rabbi A. James Rudin, director of interreligious affairs for the American Jewish Committee.

Geremek, who serves as chairman of the parliamentary committee creating a new Polish constitution, told Rudin he believes “there can be and should be cooperation between the Roman Catholic Church and Poland.”

But he added that, “in a modern European state, the principle must be the separation of church and state.”

Bishop Henryk Muszynski, chairman of the Polish Episcopate’s Commission for Dialogue With Judaism, agrees with this position.

“Both the church and state need the separation,” Muszynski told Rudin in a telephone conversation. “The church can best do its role free of the state.”

But others in the church apparently feel differently, though it is not yet clear whether the proposal has the backing of the entire Polish bishops organization or just a particular faction of clerics.

According to Rudin, the proposal was revived by the episcopate partly to further its interest in outlawing abortion, which was made a common form of birth control under Communist rule.