“A new spurt of solidarity is needed to show the splendor of the family. The world is moving in a different direction” – Grażyna Koszałka (Polish Family Council at the KEP Delegate) said inaugurating this year’s sixth Congress of Polish Families in Gdańsk. The proceedings were preceded by a solemn Holy Mass presided over by Fr. Archbishop Stanisław Gądecki.
“Saving your marriage, family and the Catholic upbringing of your children is our Westerplatte today, here and now” – Koszałka told the audience. The Metropolitan of Gdańsk, Fr. Archbishop Tadeusz Wojda, also addressed the audience. Referring to the fight against the traditional family by leftist and liberal circles, he emphasized that this family must be supported. “This family needs unique and strong support to fulfill its unique mission towards the Church, society and the world” – he said. He pointed out that this support should be shown to it in various ways, and above all, through the love with which it should be surrounded. “The world needs normal, healthy, morally ordered families, modeled on the Family of Nazareth and other great examples of holy and beautiful families, which will be the leaven of the transformation of society” – he emphasized.
“Polish families and Polish pastoral care are a great ally of the Polish diaspora work that we carry out in our country. We want to build the identity of the Polish family abroad, we want to build the identity of Poles abroad based on Christian values. This is the right path, because it is objectively good. This is the right path, because it is simply effective in terms of strong roots, in terms of not building on sand. It is also good in terms of the effectiveness of defending patriotic values, defending Polish identity” – Jan Dziedziczak, government plenipotentiary for the Polish diaspora and Poles abroad said. And that this is not an easy task, reminded Bishop Dr Piotr Turzyński, delegate of the Polish Episcopal Conference for the Pastoral Care of Polish Emigration. “We live in a world where we have a crisis of man and humanity. Some say that we are in the era of liquid reality and post-truth, where the basic laws of logic, such as the principle of non-contradiction, are no longer valid and there are no longer universals such as truth, goodness, and beauty. The world is becoming a world in fog and chaos” – he said.
Quoting Prof. Kiereś, Archbishop Turzyński noted that “the human crisis is a state of man’s spiritual collapse consisting in the loss of understanding of the world and himself, which results in the suspension of judgment and the collapse of the culture of action”. “Various kinds of ideologies want to create a man without identity, without history and without roots, without God and without sex, without nationality and ultimately without hope. But is it possible to create such a man?” – he wondered, pointing to Christianity and faith as the roots of the Polish nation. He raised awareness of the ethos of the Polish family, also expressed in the language culture, where a pregnant woman is said to be in a blessed condition, which is not the case in other languages. He recalled the figures of great Polish saints and blesseds who gave their lives to save the family and give them hope, such as Saint. Maksymilian Maria Kolbe, who went to death so that his fellow prisoner, who was the father, could have hope of leaving Auschwitz and returning to his wife and children.
The hierarch pointed to the “singles culture” as a great threat to our civilization. Continuing this thought, Fr. prof. Robert Skrzypczak noted that today’s confusion about the family and attempts to bring about the collapse of the family and marriage “are related to a huge social engineering project that aims to create a new society, a new person – a single barcode, PESEL, which will not draw any power to build their identity from the relationships of their environments and, above all, from the lasting bonds of tradition transmission. “Someone understood that attacking marriage and the family would lead to the corruption of our society” – he explained, emphasizing the existence of a close connection between the quality of the family, the quality of society and the quality of the Church. He pointed out that all totalitarian tendencies will lead, on the one hand, to the collapse of the family and, on the other hand, to the euthanasia of the Church. “There is a close connection between the quality of love in the family and the quality of faith in society” – he recalled. Drawing attention to the modern contraceptive mentality that destroys the spirituality of Polish families and Polish society, Fr. prof. Skrzypczak estimated that “the more pills, the less faith, the more pills, the less God”. “It could be said that the creators of the contraceptive pill have invented a better way to destroy faith in human souls than the entire oppressive system of Stalin” – he noted.
“The reality is that a faithful marriage, open to life, full of love, and the family that is built around such a marriage become a bastion of human freedom” – he said. He emphasized that God reveals himself in marriage and family.
The 6th Congress of Polish Families Abroad will last until Sunday. The program includes workshops, time for integration and exchange of experiences, consultations and a pilgrimage to the Sanctuary of Our Lady in Pregnancy in Gdańsk-Matemblewo.
Anna Wiejak