By Nona Moskowitz.
We attended a lecture given by Stan Obirek. Obirek's life history parallels the anthropological perspective of capturing the insider's and outsider's point of view. Although he entered Jagiellonian University to study literature, he became involved with a Jesuit group and later became a Jesuit priest. For the first half of his life, he was an active member of the Catholic Church. From this "insider's perspective" (his knowledge of the Catholic Church from his time serving as a priest), we learned that the clergy in Poland resisted confronting their own anti-semitism. He explained that being Catholic and practicing Catholicism provided a singular model of the moral person. He further explained that this hegemonic Catholicism supported a belief within the Polish Church that inter-religious dialogue is not necessary. Opposed to this belief, he found himself increasingly at odds with and critical of mainstream Catholicism—to the extent that he eventually left the Church.
The second half of Obirek's life was, then, outside of the Church, but he continued to examine it through scholarship and teaching. From this "outsider's" (academic/analytic) perspective, he continues to look at the Church critically, in both senses of the word. He brought two books with him to the lecture, Porter-Szucs' Poland in the Modern World and Waligórska's Cross-Purposes: Catholicism and the Political Imagination in Poland. Citing these sources, he explained that Roman Dmowski played a central role in linking Catholicism with nationalism. Dmowski was a social Darwinist who realized that finding an important and influential partner was essential for political success. This consolidation of national and Catholic identities entailed the othering and demonizing of Jews. To discuss the Church and Nationalism in more recent times, he brought in Waligórska's work documenting the use of the cross to connect areas that were never Polish. The Church used the cross to create a religious past that didn't exist in the way it is understood today.
Driving from city to city, we see crosses along the roadside. I asked one of our guides whether these were put up at sites where someone had died in an accident. The guide told us that many of these crosses date from before WWI. Someone who had transgressed Catholic law would put up the cross as atonement for a sin. Obirek told us that, today, there is growing opposition to the cross in public places in Poland. I wondered whether the crosses on rural roads between towns were included in that opposition. I could imagine that these oppositional voices focused on public displays on a larger, more national scale. Yet, these lonely crosses standing quietly on the roadside are a continual reminder that the Church is here.
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