Mount Saint Marys College - Eagle Yearbook (Orchard Lake, MI)

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and the Empire. During this important period when the strongest worldly power opposed the strongest spiritual force, Poland under King Boleslav' the Bold sided with Pope Gregory VII. It was with the help of Poland, too, that Pope Gregory VII was able to place King Ladislav on the throne of Hungary. Once again during the critical days of the fourteenth and fifteenth century, when the Great Western Schism rent the unity of Christendom in Europe as a result of rival claims to the papal throne-when Euro- pean countries espoused and supported the cause of the anti-popes at Avignon or at Pisa, Poland stood loyally by the Pope of Rome. At the Council of Constance which finally healed the schism, the Polish Arch- bishop, Nicholas Traba, helped in the election of Pope Martin V. When the Protestant Revolt broke out in the sixteenth century en- dangering both Papacy and Church, Poland once again strongly mani- fested its loyalty to the Vicar of Christ. When Pope Leo X issued the Bull Exmrge Domine, on june 15, 1520, condemning forty-one prop- ositions in I.uther's writings, King Sigismund I enforced this Bull and by the Edict of Torun prohibited the introduction of Luther's works into Poland. Sigismund also condemned Lutheranism by statute and demanded strict adherence to the Faith. He ordered the Bishops and Inquisitors to enforce his law. In 1554, the king forbade the nobles to send their sons to the University of Wittenberg, the very center of Lutheranism. Poland continued to work hand in hand with the Holy See in the work of Catholic Reform. In 1561, a delegation was sent from Poland to take part in the deliberations of the Council of Trent. Sigismund II was among the first European monarchs to accept and enforce the Tridentine decrees in his realm. Toward the end of the sixteenth century, the Polish clergy assisted the papacy in its efforts to unite the schismatic Ruthenians with the Catholic Church. Under the leadership of great churchmen, Cardinal Hosius and the Jesuits Skarga and Herbest, the ground was prepared for reuniting the schismatics with the Holy See. Pope' Gregory XIII erected a seminary in Wilno and admitted both Ruthenian and Russian students into various Catholic colleges. In 1596, the Union of Brest brought many Ruthenians to recognize the Pope and to accept his au- thority as Vicar of Christ. Almost simultaneously with these efforts Poland used her influence to bring back to the Church many Armenian Christians, who recognized the authority of the Pope in the seventeenth century. ' When Sweden attacked Poland in 1655, the royal crown rested upon the head of john Casimir. During the invasion, King john Casimir made his famous vows in the presence of the papal legate on the first day of April, 1656. He proclaimed the Blessed Mother Queen and Patroness of Poland. Pope Alexander VII regarded the victory of King john Casimir as a triumph of Catholicism over Protestantism, giving the Polish ruler the title Rex orthodoxur. At the call of Pope Innocent XI, King John Sobieski led a Polish army to Vienna and in 1683 defeated the Turks who threatened Euro- pean Christendom. For this great feat, the Pope headed a list of eminent people who thanked the Polish king personally for what he had done in behalf of the Christian nations of Europe. The sixteenth century religious partition of the Church was' dupli- cated politically in eighteenth century Poland by the triple partition of the Polish kingdom. Poland's great effort to stem the partitions failed, but it left another testimonial of loyalty to the Church in the May Con- stitution of 1791, which proclaimed Catholicism as the dominant re- ligion of the realm. This loyalty was not shaken even in the darkest days of the partitions when josephinism and Germanism in Austrian- held Poland, Germanism and Protestantism in Prussian-held areas, and Russification and Schism in Russian-controlled territories sought to destroy contacts between Poland and the Papacy. Perhaps the' most serious threat to Polish loyalty came in 1852, when, upon the tenderitious and misleading protests of Russia following the November insurrection of 1850, Pope Gregory XVI issued an encyclical to the Polish hierarchy which was greeted with much opposition in certain Polish quarters. But even this matter was successfully smoothed our, though it left its influence in the writings of Mickiewicz and Slowacki. Two outstanding champions of loyaltv to the Church atmeared in Prussian-held Poland when Archbishop Martin Dunin and Archbishop 117

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116 as a refuge of all who fled from political and other troubles in the Old World, and that His Holiness, should he see fit to go to the United States, would no doubt meet with a kind welcome and be left to pursue, unquestioned and unmolested, his great work as Head of the Catholic Church. It was during the incumbency of Minister King that the Holy See was approached by the Confederacy, not exactly for recognition as a separate state, but as a sign that the Southern leaders fully appreciated the value of the sympathy of so great a liberal statesman as Pius IX. The American legation at the court of Pius IX lasted through the Civil War, but came to an official end in 1867, when Congress refused to appropriate the money necessary for its upkeep. Had an American Minister been resident in Rome in 1870 when the Italian army took the Eternal City, the question of the Pope's taking refuge in the United States might have been revived and Pius IX might have come to America. In the twentieth century, the most important development in the relations between the United States and the Papacy was President Franklin D. Roosevelt's appointment of an Episcopalian, Myron C. Tay- lor, as his personal representative to Pope Pius XII. This appointment resulted from an exchange of letters between the President and the Pope. As Myron C. Taylor himself relates: The President was con- vinced that a closer association in all parts of the free world between those in government and those in religion who shared common ideals was essential . . . To His Holiness in Rome, with whom personal ex- changes of views were possible only through correspondence and a trusted intermediary, he suggested sending a personal representative. In the letter which President Roosevelt sent to Pius XII on December 23, 1959, he explained that he had named Taylor his personal envoy in order that our parallel endeavors for peace and the alleviation of suffering may be assisted. The many thousands of American Catholic pilgrims who will visit the Holy City and pay their respects to the Pope in this twenty-fifth Holy Year will carry with them the heartfelt sentiments of millions of their compatriots, mindful of the cordial relationship that has existed between the United States and the Papacy during the last 170 years. Daniel Pokornowski PULHIID Hllll THE PUPES Poland, historically speaking, is only half as old as the Papacy. It appeared on the historical stage of Europe when the Papacy had al- ready nearly one thousand years behind it. When the first historic ruler of Poland received baptism and opened the way for the introduction of Christianity among his people in 966, the Papal tiara reposed upon the head of Pope john XIII, the one hundred and thirty-third successor of Saint Peter. In the one thousand years that have -elapsed since that fateful mo- ment, Poland's contacts with the Papacy have been constant and on certain occasions especially noteworthy. There are several such instances which are particularly worth recalling. The first occurred in 966 when the Papacy was still far from exer- cising a dominant influence over the Holy Roman Empire. In 965, Mieszko, the ruler of still pagan Poland, married Dabrowka, a Chris- tian daughter of a Czech prince. A year later, Mieszko received the sacrament of baptism, and afterwards placed his territory in the hands of the Holy See, making it a part of the heritage of Saint Peter and securing for Poland papal protection for all time. The second instance of Polish-Papal relations took place when Poland supported the Papacy in its time of need. This happened dur- ing the investiture controversy between Pope Gregory VII and Emperor Henry IV. When Gregory VII ascended the papal throne, he initiated important reforms for the emancipation of the church from lay control. Under pain of excommunication, Pope Gregory VII forbade princes to bestow ecclesiastical offices upon members of the clergy. He also for- bade the clergy to receive these investitures from the hands of laymen. When Henry IV ignored the Pope's orders, Gregory VII excommuni- cated him, precipitating-a bitter and long struggle between the Papacy

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118 Mieczyslaw Ledochowski resisted not only Germanization but also Protestantization fostered by the Prussian government and by Bis- marck's Kulmrkampf. Archbishop Ledochowski was subsequently made Cardinal and Prefect of the Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith which greatly expanded its activities under his direction. ' After the resurrection of Poland in 1919, the centuries-old Cordlfll relations between Poland and the Papacy were once again formallylre- established. Poland's Constitution of March, 1921, declared in Afflfle 14 that the Roman Catholic Church occupied in the State the chief position among other faiths with equal rights. In fulfillment of this constitutional article, a Concordat was negotiated between the Holy See and the Polish Republic. It was signed in Rome by Cardinal Gasparri representing Pope Pius Xl and Vladislav Skraynski and Stanislav Grabski representing the President of the Polish Republic, and ratified in Warsaw on May 30, 1925. This Concordat guaranteed complete free- dom for the Church in the Polish State as well as in its relation with the Holy See. Today alien influences seek to destroy this thousand year old. rela- tionship between Poland and the Papacy. But they shall not prevail, for Poland's loyalty to the Popes is as solid as the rock on which the Papacy rests. Stanley Malinowski lHf PUPES Hllll PULHHIJ Twenty-five Popes occupied the chair of Peter during the calamitous years of the tenth century which have been described by one church historian as the darkest age of the church. One of these Popes, john XIII, Who became Pope in 965 and ruled for seven years, won the last- ing gratitude of the Poles through the centuries by extending the pro- tection of the Holy See over the infant Christian kingdom, shielding it from Germanic expansion. This was the first of many papal interventions on behalf of Poland in subsequent crises in the country's history. In the thirteenth century, when Vladislav the Short tried to reunite Poland, his efforts proved useless and instead he was three times driven from the country. In this crisis, he sought aid from the Vicar of Christ, Boniface VIII, and re- gained his throne through the assistance of the Pope. In 1331, King Vladislav began Poland's long struggle against the Teutonic Knights. In the conflicts which followed, Poland was morally assisted by several Popes, John XXII, Urban V, Boniface IX, and Gregory XII, until her victory at Grunwald in 1415. Another Pope, Urban V, was responsible for the formal establishment of Poland's first institution of higher learning, the University of Kra- kow, founded in 1364 at the behest of Casimir the Great. Among its outstanding alumni were Kopernik and St. john Kanty. In the sixteenth century, when Poland was threatened by Calvinism, Hussitism, and Lutheranism, Pope Pius IV made Bishop Stanislav Hosius a Cardinal and sent the Jesuits to Poland to defend the Catholic faith. Papal interest in the Polish Episcopate, which produced such out- standing reforming Bishops as Martin Kromer, Stanislav Karnkowski, john Solikowski, Bernard Maciejowski and George Radziwill enabled the country to avoid the pitfalls of Protestantism. In the seventeenth century, Pope Clement X called on the Poles to forget domestic quatrels and unite themselves against the Turks. This message was a vital factor in the Polish victory over the Turks at Chocirn. When the Sultan of Turkey tried to extend his rule over southeastern Europe, Pope Innocent XI begged King john Sobieski to come to Europe's assistance and help besieged Vienna. Sobieski heeded the Pope's call and helped save European Christendom by liberating the city. When Poland's neighbors began meddling in Polish affairs in the eighteenth century, Pope Clement XIII called on the entire nation to stand firm in defense of the Catholic faith, contributing to the organi- zation of the Confederation of Bar. When Russia began violently to meddle in Polish affairs, the Pope intervened by insisting on the in- violability of Poland's Catholicism and tried to persuade King Louis XV of France to come to Poland's assistance. In the nineteenth century, Popes Gregory XVI and Pius IX in times l l i i l 1 I i l