Jerzy Popiełuszko

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jerzy Popiełuszko
Popieluszko Europena (03) .jpg
Funeral of Jerzy Popiełuszko
Funeral of Jerzy Popiełuszko

Jerzy Popiełuszko [ jɛʐɨ popʲɛwuʂko ] (born September 14, 1947 in Okopy near Suchowola as Alfons Popiełuszko ; † October 19, 1984 at Włocławek ) was a Polish Roman Catholic priest who, because of his support for the opposition to Solidarność, of officers of the Polish State Security Service ( Służba Bezpieczeństwa ) was murdered. In 2010 Popiełuszko was beatified .

Life

Popiełuszko came from a simple, rural background in the northeast of the country. After high school, he entered the seminary in Warsaw. He therefore had to do military service from 1966 to 1968 in a feared special unit for candidates for priesthood in Bartoszyce . After several pastorships, he became student chaplain.

During the 1980 strikes , Kaplan Popiełuszko served as a chaplain to support the Warsaw steel workers. After the Solidarność trade union was banned , his St. Stanisław Kostka community became a gathering place for opposition civil rights activists. In his sermons he sharply criticized the communist regime in Poland at the time, the martial law imposed in 1981 and the ban on the Solidarność union. His monthly “Mass for the Fatherland” was so popular that it was broadcast outdoors via loudspeakers. Like many other Polish parishes, Popiełuszkos parish supported the families of opponents of the regime who had lost their jobs or were in prison. The community received relief supplies from the International Society for Human Rights, among others . The Polish government saw these contacts as "anti-state connections". The consequences were spying, threats and interrogations. In December 1983 Popiełuszko was searched for explosives, grenades and ammunition, among other things. On the basis of this bogus evidence, he was arrested for sabotage, but soon after pressure from the public and on the intervention of Bishop Bronisław Dąbrowski to the Interior Minister Czesław Kiszczak released and then pardoned under an amnesty.

On October 13, 1984, an attack by the security service failed by throwing a stone at his passing car.

On October 16, 1984, the then primate Józef Glemp offered him a study visit to Rome, which he refused.

On October 19, 1984, three officers of the Polish Communist State Security Service Służba Bezpieczeństwa , led by Grzegorz Piotrowski , stopped his car near Toruń and kidnapped him. They beat him with fists and wooden clubs, tied stones to his feet and drowned him in the Vistula Reservoir near Włocławek . His body was found there on October 30th.

The perpetrators, Grzegorz Piotrowski , Leszek Pękala and Waldemar Chmielewski , were discovered because the priest's driver escaped and had memorized the license plate. The public reacted angrily to the discovery of the water corpse.

The funeral on November 3, 1984 in his St. Stanisław Kostka parish in Warsaw, which was attended by up to 800,000 people, turned into a demonstration against the communist state power.

The government of General Wojciech Jaruzelski had the perpetrators tried. In the course of this, the public prosecutor's office even demanded the death penalty for the main perpetrator. However, there were sentences between 10 and 25 years in prison that were later moderated. In addition, the judges declared at the time that there were no backers. It was not until 2004 that documents were published according to which Jaruzelski suspected his former interior minister and member of the Central Committee, General Mirosław Milewski, as a mastermind, but who could rely on the powerful Soviet secret service KGB . Nevertheless, the speedy investigation of the crime is considered to be one of the “last coffin nails for the communist regime in Poland”.

The kidnapping and murder of Popiełuszko became a symbol of the resistance, the political role of the Catholic Church and the brutality of the security apparatus in the then People's Republic of Poland .

So far, around 24 million pilgrims have visited his grave, including John Paul II , Benedict XVI. , George HW Bush and Margaret Thatcher .

On July 8, 1997, Pope John Paul II initiated the process of beatification for Jerzy Popiełuszko. Pope Benedict XVI spoke out in favor of an acceleration of the process and recognized him by a decree on December 19, 2009 the heroic degree of virtue . On June 6, 2010 Popiełuszko was beatified as a martyr by Pope Benedict XVI, represented by Pro-Prefect Archbishop Angelo Amato , in front of about 100,000 to 250,000 believers and in the presence of his mother Marianna Popiełuszko on Piłsudski Square in Warsaw .

Jerzy Popiełuszko has been venerated in the "Black Madonna" chapel in Illdorf ( Bavaria ) since July 13, 1986 .

plant

  • Jerzy Popieluszko; Franciszek Blachnicki (translator and publisher): To the people: Sermons and reflections 1982–1984 , Erb, Düsseldorf, ISBN 3-88458-098-1 .

literature

  • Siegfried Lammich: The Popieluszko Trial - Security Police and Catholic Church in Poland . Report and documentation on behalf of the International Society for Human Rights . With a foreword by Josef Stimpfle . Verlag Wissenschaft und Politik, Cologne 1985, ISBN 3-8046-8663-X .
  • Georg Motylewitz: That was Popieluszko - a documentation . Herder, Vienna / Freiburg im Breisgau 1985, ISBN 3-901699-06-6 .
  • Zygmunt Malacki The Servant of God Jerzy Popiełuszko , translated by Stephanie Zloch and Magdalena Kurkowska, editor Ewa A. Zaja̜c, Wydawnitctwo Sióstr Loretanek, Warszawa 2003, ISBN 83-7257-132-5 .
  • Ewa Czaczkowska, Tomasz Wiścicki: Ksiądz Jerzy Popiełuszko. Świat Książki, Warszawa 2004, ISBN 978-83-7391-682-1 ( Polish ).
  • Cesare G. Zucconi: Jerzy Popiełuszko - The martyrdom of a priest in communist Poland . Echter, Würzburg 2020, ISBN 978-3-429-05425-0

Movie

  • 1988: To Kill a Priest ( To Kill A Priest ) - Director: Agnieszka Holland
  • 2009: Popieluszko. The freedom within us ( Popiełuszko. Wolność jest w nas ) - Director: Rafał Wieczyński

Visual arts

The Düsseldorf sculptor Bert Gerresheim created a statue of Johannes von Nepomuk with the face of Popiełuszko in 1985 , and the Popiełuszko monument in Warsaw in 2007.

Web links

Commons : Jerzy Popiełuszko  - album with pictures, videos and audio files
 Wikinews: Beatification of Pastor Popiełuszko  - message

Footnotes

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h Gerhard Gnauck: A martyr of the 20th century. Poland's pastor Popieluszko is beatified. Die Welt, June 5, 2010, accessed on September 11, 2012 .
  2. ↑ Piotr Litka: Prowokacja na Chłodnej. Onet, October 9, 2009, accessed September 11, 2012 (Polish).
  3. ↑ Milena Kindziuk: Ksiądz Jerzy Popiełuszko. Axel Springer Polska, Warszawa 2009, ISBN 978-83-7558-255-0
  4. ↑ Milena Kindziuk: Ksiądz Jerzy Popiełuszko. Axel Springer Polska, Warszawa 2009, p. 94, ISBN 978-83-7558-255-0
  5. ↑ a b [1]
  6. ↑ Piotr Lipiński: Acct Kazal zamordować ks. Popiełuszkę? Milewski: never yes. Gazeta.pl, October 5, 2004, archived from the original on August 19, 2010 ; Retrieved September 11, 2012 (Polish).
  7. ^ Dieter Bingen : Poland: 1000 years of eventful history . In: Information on Political Education No. 311/2011 . S. 16. Retrieved October 1, 2016.
  8. ^ Bogumił Łoziński: Ksiądz Popiełuszko szybciej świętym. dziennik.pl, February 4, 2009, accessed September 11, 2012 (Polish).
  9. ↑ Vatican: John Paul II and Pius XII. receive "degree of virtue".
  10. ↑ Paul Flückiger: Priest of Protest. Der Tagesspiegel, June 6, 2010, accessed on September 11, 2012 .
  11. ↑ Memory of Popieluszko ( Memento from March 15, 2012 in the Internet Archive )
  12. ↑ Ludwig Wagner: Died for faith. Augsburger Allgemeine, June 17, 2010, accessed on September 11, 2012 .
  13. ↑ Popieluszko , film
  14. ↑ The "bridge saint" Johannes von Nepomuk  in the German Digital Library
personal data
SURNAME Popiełuszko, Jerzy
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Polish clergyman who was murdered by the Polish State Security Service, Seliger
DATE OF BIRTH September 14, 1947
PLACE OF BIRTH Okopy near Suchowola , Poland
DATE OF DEATH October 19, 1984
Place of death near Włocławek , Poland