Poland: A theocracy for the 21st century

I find it fascinating that in an age when so much is being said about Islamist groups vying for control of various countries, and of Islam becoming a factor in government, that nothing is being said about the same thing happening in the Christian Nation of Poland.

For the last three weeks I've been reading news from Poland about various obnoxious indiscretions by priests and others in Poland. Whether it be the involuntary designation of some teachers to put together an altar for a holiday, or the blaring of church hymns at 6:30 in the morning over church loudspeakers, or the mandate that Religious Instruction in schools will now count towards overall grade, all these things are coming in a sort of Medieval Resurgence, as if the Polish church is determined to obliterate itself by pissing everyone off beyond their limits.

The problem is, people aren't reacting to all this the way I was expecting. Yes, people are getting angry, but there is a latent fearful respect for the church that the priests are keen to capitalize on. Even those speaking against these events always add the disclaimer that they are believers, that they are churchgoers, and that fundamentally, they don't really have a problem with this, just that... And any reference to non-believers is dismissed outright as practically impossible. If you live in Poland, it seems, you're automatically a Catholic Believer, no other options are available. And it's not just the priests who profess such twisted views, there are plenty of little old ladies all over the country who are more intolerant than any other group I have seen, including neo-nazis. The only thing that prevents these folks from causing more physical harm is the fact that they're usually over 60 and frail.

One thought I had a while back was that Pope John Paul's death may be a boon for Poland, as there will be less restraint by the common person to criticize the church, and the church itself would be more exposed, and so more wary of overstepping its bounds. The thing I didn't count on was that maybe the previous Pope was actually the source of the Polish church's restraint in some areas, and that now that he is gone, the church feels it has a free hand to impose itself more directly on Polish every day life. Just goes to show, you can never predict the future.

So then, how will this unfold? It seems so long as the better-educated, more motivated Polish individuals keep leaving the country to work abroad, the gray masses left behind will continue to support the priests in their efforts. Only when people start coming back, understanding the concepts of diversity, tolerance, and separation of church and state, that things will change. An influx of immigrants, in the meantime, would only make things worse here, as those immigrants would just provide a convenient target for the priests to strengthen their hold on the populace.

I lament what is happening in my country. It has such potential, and that keeps getting undercut by such ridiculous, primitive problems. We may be living in the 21st century, but many people in the country have not gotten past the Middle Ages just yet. And why should they? After all, the Middle Ages were a golden time for the Polish kingdom. *sigh*