Catholic Responses to Poland’s “New Reality,” 1945–1953

Abstract

During the years 1945–1953, the Kraków weekly Tygodnik Powszechny, approved by both Church and state, occupied a unique position. Its apolitical stance, inspired to a large extent by the Catholic philosophy of personalism, meant that within certain limits it enjoyed remarkable freedom. This article considers Tygodnik’s place in the early postwar Polish landscape, including its avowedly apolitical approach (dubbed “minimalism”) as it compared with that of other Catholic groups, how it dealt with increasing communist pressure, and what it managed to achieve before its closure. Among Tygodnik’s primary concerns were the defence of Polish society and culture against the war’s lingering psychological aftereffects, for example by encouraging discussions of what now would be called society’s “post-traumatic shock,” and reconciliation with the Germans. The newspaper also sought to defend Polish culture against communisation, in part by providing a forum for unconventional writers (who were at least nominally Catholic), resisting socialist realism and publishing information on nonsocialist-realist art and music, and addressing the changes being implemented by the communists in terms of secularisation. With mounting pressure, however, Tygodnik found it increasingly difficult to make acceptable compromises, until finally in 1953 its editorial board deemed it impossible to continue its coexistence with the communist regime. As a result, it was closed by authorities until a change in the political climate enabled Tygodnik to renew publication in 1956.