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Polish Sources of the Ideology of the National Church Organised by Bishop Franciszek Hodur

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Polish Sources of the Ideology of the National Church Organised by Bishop Franciszek Hodur Polish sources of the ideology of the National Church organised by bishop Franciszek Hodur Autor(en): Baakier, Edward Objekttyp: Article Zeitschrift: Internationale kirchliche Zeitschrift : neue Folge der Revue internationale de théologie Band (Jahr): 76 (1986) Heft 2 PDF erstellt am: 29.01.2018 Persistenter Link: http://doi.org/10.5169/seals-404709 Nutzungsbedingungen Die ETH-Bibliothek ist Anbieterin der digitalisierten Zeitschriften. Sie besitzt keine Urheberrechte an den Inhalten der Zeitschriften. Die Rechte liegen in der Regel bei den Herausgebern. Die auf der Plattform e-periodica veröffentlichten Dokumente stehen für nicht-kommerzielle Zwecke in Lehre und Forschung sowie für die private Nutzung frei zur Verfügung. Einzelne Dateien oder Ausdrucke aus diesem Angebot können zusammen mit diesen Nutzungsbedingungen und den korrekten Herkunftsbezeichnungen weitergegeben werden. 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Counting from the origin of its con¬ ception, it usually takes many years for the movement to assume an organised shape, to clearly define its aims and ideology and work out its constitution. Ideology is the necessary condition which makes it possible for any new movement, either social or religious, to originate, exist and devel¬ op. Nobleness and loftiness of the purposes laid down by ideology are the measure of culture of the movement itself. The Polish National Catholic Church, known before as the Nation¬ al Church, is one of such new religious movements. It was organised by Bishop Franciszek Hodur in the United States of America at the end of the XlXth century and transferred to Poland at the beginning of the XXth century. The National Church is deeply rooted in the Polish history, litera¬ ture and philosophy, i.e. in progressive social, patriotic and religious thought characteristic of our nation. Upon examining the origin of the thought and its development, we come to meet its representatives: social and religious workers, histo¬ rians, philosophers, pastors, writers and priests. These people, work¬ ing actively throughout the history of Poland, boldly criticised organi¬ sation and ideology of the Roman Catholic Church and aimed at or¬ ganising the Polish Church which would be independent from Rome and which would unite religion with national ideals and social work. Already in the XVth century, just before the Reformation, we come up a writer and an active lay member of the community, who spoke for cutting all ties with papacy and for uniting the Polish Church with the state and nationalizing its ceremonial. It was Jan Ostroróg (1436-1501), voivode of Poznan, graduate of foreign universities: Uni¬ versity of Erfurt and University of Bologna, doctor of both laws, author of an excellent piece of work entitled "Monumentum pro Rei- publicae ordinatione" ("Memorial on the organisation of the Re¬ public"). In this work the'author condemned humiliating dependence of Poland on papacy and criticized covetousness, simony and scandal¬ ous ignorance of the clergy. He criticized considerable participation 96 of Germans in the life of the church and spread of the German lan¬ guage in sermons and liturgy. Moreover, he suggested to the king the necessity of closer subordination of the Polish Church to the state. Jan Ostroróg especially attacked economic destructiveness of de¬ pendence on Rome. The dependence brought about harmful unhu- man and arduous payments in favour of Roman curia, in form of Peter's penny, annates, charges for lawsuits and appeals to Rome. "Crafty and cunning Italians - Jan Ostroróg writes - extort from Poles great amount of money, real treasures and for that they send us church fair bullas". Then, the voivode of Poznan calls: "Gentlemen, Poles, do not let the crafty Italians deceive you any longer!" Jan Ostroróg's way of thinking was daring and it contained both deep political wisdom and clear sympathy for the idea of organising the Polish Church. In the XVIth century, when the Reformation spread throughout Poland, the idea of creating the Polish Church was first of all taken up by Polish noblemen of intellect. At that time they had ambitious plans to reform the whole political system of the Republic. From 1536 till 1565, during regional councils in Cracow, Piotrków, Lublin and Warsaw, Polish nobility aimed towards reformation of politics, economy of the country as well as social and religious life. In the field of religion and social activity the problem of the unity of religion took the lead. Here, nobility postulated to convene a national council with king at the head. Noblemen believed that the na¬ tional council would loosen or altogether cut the ties of dependence of the Polish Church on Rome as well as initiate the national language in liturgy, revoke celibacy of the clergy, i. e. that it would create a natio¬ nal Church in Poland uniting the multi-religious Republic into one community - as far as religion is concerned. It would, without doubt, be an act of great religious, social and political meaning. Arguments for the National Church in Poland were put forward by the most outstanding thinkers and propagators of the idea. Among them Andrzej Frycz Modrzewski (1503-1572), the chief officer of a group of villages from Wolbórz, was most active at that time. He was a writer with university education - a quality seldom found in the XVIth century Poland - and a beautiful character. Ignacy Chrzanowski, a well-known historian, calls him "one of the greatest moral beauties, of whom Poland could be proud of. This man of spotless integrity de¬ voted a great number of his works to the spread of the idea of a national Church and in struggle for the realization of this idea he en- 97 gaged his noble heart, great mind and an excellent pen. Andrzej Frycz Modrzewski described the problem of a national Church in his monu¬ mental piece of work entitled "De republica emendanda" ("On the Reformation of the Republic", 1554). In the second book of this work, in the book about the Church, J. F. Modrzewski made a frontal assault on the Roman Catholic Church position. He accused papacy as well as the highest church dignitaries and all the clergy of ignorance, indo¬ lence, carelessness, laziness, immoral and wasteful way of life, exces¬ sive exorbitance, negligence of ministration and lack of concern for religion, which brought the Church to the brink of a precipice. Andrzej Frycz Modrzewski hoped that King Sigismund Augustus would comply with the request of the nobility and convene the nation¬ al council in order to settle the problem of the Church in Poland. He personally asked the King to do that, reminding him at the same time that it is his duty. "The King must convene the national council in or¬ der to gain penetrating insight into the teachings of religious rites in general, demoralization, offences which breed and expand in ever- widening circles ..." (Writings, vol. V, p. 157). Andrzej Frycz Modrzewski described to the King a splendid vision of the future which was to be the outcome of debates of the national council convened on the King's initiative: "... that happy day, when the Christian Republic will reap the fruits of the King's actions, when everybody will be happy to have one religion, one cult of God the Fa¬ ther and the Son and the Holy Spirit; and the whole court of heavenly beings will pay tribute to the King for that great deed." (Writings, vol.V, p.48). For some time King Augustus was inclining to those conceptions. Soon, however, he changed his mind under the pressure of such people as Cardinal Kozjusz and apostolic nuncios, especially the most outstanding among them - nuncio Commendone, who didn't want to let the national council be convened. They sensed that under the cloak of this "innocent" request a tendency to create the Polish Church independent of Rome was hidden. It is extremely interesting that there was a man who for some time dreamed of sovereignty of the Polish Church, of cutting all ties with Rome, introducing the Polish language into liturgy and revoking celi¬ bacy of the clergy, i.e. - in one word - of the national Church. It was Jakub Uchanski, Bishop of Chetin, later - Bishop of Wloctaw and fi¬ nally - Primate of the Roman Catholic Church in Poland. He even wanted to be at the top of such a Church. At the royal court, where he 98 held the office of king's referendary, he got acquainted with advocates of church reform, took part in their meetings, bestowed his friendship on them and became a good friend of Andrzej Frycz Modrzewski. Dispute between Jakub Uchahski and Rome created a chance to undertake steps towards the reform of the Polish Church and exemp¬ tion from pope's jurisdiction. After the death of Bishop Drohojewski of Kujawy, King Sigismund Augustus appointed Jakub Uchahski to this post. Jakub Uchahski had been then holding the office of Bishop of Chelm for six years. Pope Paul IV did not want to confirm the nom¬ ination because other Polish bishops accused Jakub Uchahski of sym¬ pathizing with the Reformation.
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