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Praised
be Jesus Christ!
Dear
faithful brothers and sisters,
beloved fellow-countrymen.
During
the Vatican Council, Cardinal Heenan, President of the
English Hierachy, visited the Polish bishops who were
staying in the College on the Aventine Hill. His words
were impressed on my memory with remarkable force. He
began his address with the words, 'Polish airmen saved
Britain.'
I refer to these words today because it seems
to me that it is there we must search for a reply to the
question of your identity here. Who are you? Are you
merely a community of emigrants similar to many existing
throughout the world? That you certainly are. And it
is certainly necessary to seek here an analogy with the
Great Emigration of the last century, which was chiefly
concentrated in France. Nevertheless, there is something
special which in a certain sense stops us from thinking
of you in terms of 'emigration'. At least it stops us
from thinking thus of the people Cardinal Heenan
had in mind when he said, 'The Polish airmen
saved Britain.'
It is
impossible to think of you in terms of an
'emigration'; we must think of you as expressed by the
reality of 'fatherland'. True, before the second
World War there were a certain number of Polish
emigrants in England. However, those who found
themselves here as a result of wartime events were not
emigrants. They were Poland wrenched out of her own frontiers,
from her own battlefields - Poland re-awakened, barely
twenty years earlier, to an independent existence,
Poland which was rapidly being re-built after age-old
destruction and handicaps. Poland, in fact, which once again
was the subject of an attempt to divide her as in the eighteenth century,
imposing on her a terrible and murderous war with the
dominating forces of the invaders.
That is
how it is. What today we have become accustomed to
calling the "English Polonia" came about as the very
backbone of Poland, fighting for the sacred cause of her
independence, fighting once again under the
watchword 'For our Liberty and yours'. Such a Poland was
composed of the airmen defending the British Isles, the
divisions and brigades at Narvik, the divisions and
brigades made up of Poles emerging from the depth of Soviet
Republics in Eastern Europe and Asia, and then across
Persia, the Middle East, Egypt and Libya on to the
Italian Apennines at Monte Casino, contributing to the
restitution of liberty to 'Italian Soil'. I still
have before my eyes that inscription across the street
in the centre of Bologna
leading to the War Cemetery. I
passed it on 18th April this year, the inscription
reading, "Your compatriots came by this way
bringing us liberty - come along the same way, to
strengthen our
Faith".
What I
am saying flows from a keen sense of history. You who
have created the "English Polonia" of today are for me not
first and foremost emigrants, but first and
foremost the living part of Poland which, although
torn from its native soil, does not cease to be
itself. So it lives with the conviction that within it,
within
that very part, the whole of Poland exists in a special
way.
As I
stand a pilgrim on English soil, a pilgrim Pope and at
the same time a son of the same land as you, I cannot
help expressing above all this truth about you, the
truth which I have always felt. I have felt its basic
authenticity and at the same time the essence of
its tragedy.
But
then, while recognising your unquestionable
right, at the inception, to be a specific and vital part of Poland - its
government, army, administration and structures of
authority
both for the country and beyond - one cannot fail
to notice (especially with the passage of years), that
painful physical absence into which has had to
evolve your spontaneous and splendid, historically
irremovable presence of Poland ... beyond Poland. One cannot
fail to recall once again the Great Emigration and those
great, more than great spirits, which, guided by their
sense of the living presence prayed: '...my country,
thou
art like good health; I never knew till now how
precious, till I lost thee. Now I see thy beauty whole,
because I yearn for thee" (trans: Kenneth Mackenzie,
"Pan Tadeusz", London, 1964).
A
rather wonderful mystery of coincidences and hearts
began to unravel in the last century and is recurring
today. Poland is one of the most sorely tried countries
in the entire world. One of the countries most deeply furrowed
by suffering - and at the same time one of the most
loved. Perhaps
the mystery of that unusual love of the homeland is
partly made up of that wonderful translocation of the
spirit: for so many of her sons and daughters (and often
for the best of them), though physically absent, she
becomes spiritually present. And then for those living in
Poland, this absence is not merely absence. It is a
challenge. The 'absent ones' not only 'are not right' -
at the same time they bear a historic testimony. They
speak of Poland as she was - and as she should be. They
speak of what her true worth was - and what it remains.
That is
why your sacrifice and toil, the blood of so many of our
brothers and sisters, despite the unfulfilled objectives
for which they struggled, were not in vain.
History, especially the history of our fatherland, is full
of noble deeds. We see them in contemporary times, too.
We know that the efforts aimed at freedom, at respect
for the dignity of man, at respect for his labour, at the
possibility to live in peace
with one's own conscience and convictions seemingly have
not attained the desired objectives. Yet they have
changed the soul of the nation, and its awareness; these efforts lift
up the spirit. They show that in life
there are other spiritual and moral values not to be
measured by material criteria, but they are the decisive
values in the true hierarchy of human existence.
Where
does this inward strength of Polish emigrantion come from?
- I ask this, thinking not so much of the past
which I have already mentioned, but especially with the
view to the future.
The
roots should be found on the banks of
the Vistula river, in the faith of the Poles and in their
culture. As I said at Gniezno during my
pilgrimage to our fatherland, "Culture is the expression
of man ...
Man creates culture and through culture creates himself
... At the same time he creates culture in communion with
others ... Polish culture is a value on which the
spiritual life of Poles rests. It
distinguishes us as a nation. It is decisive for us
throughout the course of history, more decisive even
than material power. Indeed, it is more decisive than political
boundaries. As is well known the Polish nation passed
through the hard trial of loss of its independence for
over
a hundred years. And in the midst of this trial the
nation remained herself. It remained spiritually independent, because
it had its
own culture. What is more my friends: We know that in
this most tragic period of partition the nation still
enriched and deepened it so much; for culture can only
be preserved through creative development."
It must
be said today that this was true, also, after the last war. The merits of your emigrantion are
commonly known in the field of research and
publications about the history of Poland, particularly
concerning the last century. It is a great
contribution to the knowledge of the true history of the
nation. If this contribution of research and publication
were lacking, the knowledge of the past Polish history -
indeed a sort of 'self knowledge' of Poles would be
incomplete.
I also
said at Gniezno that Polish culture bears very clear
marks of Christianity, and it is not by chance that 'Bogurodzica' (hymn
to the Mother of God, our oldest historical monument)
gives evidence to this culture.
It is
precisely to these Christian roots that we must always
return and grow anew from them in every age. For
such is truth about man. He always has to discover
it anew.
The
emigration will fulfil its mission the more
effectively the higher their ethical level is, the more
that Christ is the centre of its life and activity, the
more it believes that he alone is 'the way, the truth
and the life' (Jn 14:6).
In the
encyclical Redemptor Hominis I said that "Jesus
Christ goes to meet man in every age, in our age too,
with the same words: "You will know the truth and the
truth will make you free ..." Today also, after
two thousand years, Christ appears to us as the One who
brings man freedom based on truth ..." (No. 12).
It must
be said that you did understand and continue to
understand the need of the bond to the Faith and the
Church. That is why emigration as a part of
the nation, contained all the strata of society, the
whole social profile with its political, cultural,
scientific and professional institutions, but also with
the entire ecclesiastical organisation. From the very
first moment the Church was present with its structures:
there was the Bishop, the unforgettable Archbishop Gawlina, and later the Rector of the Polish Mission
(in
England), there were the priests and developing religious
organisations. They were among
the first organised centres. Thanks to the understanding
and goodwill of the
local hierarchy, but above all thanks to your generosity
and to the self-sacrificing work of the priests, so many
Polish churches and chapels were established; they serve
indeed to strengthen your links with Christ and
introduce you to the Divine Mysteries, uniting you with
Christ. In conjunction with
these pastoral centres, schools have been set up in
which the Polish language is taught.
The
link with Polish culture is forged in the home,
in religious life and in the life of organisations. On
the other hand, the school, higher studies and
professional life unite with the culture of the
country of residence. The link between the land of
your fathers and the country of residence is brought
about especially at the level of culture. It is culture
that provides the correct prospective of coexistence,
and through
education prepares a young person both for his
tasks within the emigrant sphere and also for taking up
the right attitude to life.
However, one of the most important tasks is the passing
on of proper ideas to the new generation. The émigré
community must be capable of educating, appropriate
educating
of the complete man. Only in such a case will the
younger generation be capable of accepting the idea of
freedom and truth from the older generation.
Education of the complete man, education in
truth and education in Christian and Polish tradition, begins in the family. The present state of public
morals does not always guarantee the family, and
especially the parents, the necessary authority which is
their due.
There
are various causes contributing to this. The family
therefore needs particular pastoral care. Only the
family which is strong in God and conscious of its
Christian duties is competent to carry out the tasks of
educating the complete man, since, as I said on another
occasion, "the work of educating man is not carried
out with the help of institutions alone, with the
help of organised and material means, even the best
... the most important is always man, man and
his moral
authority, emanating from the truth of his
principles and from the conformity of his actions with
these principles" (Address to UNESCO, 2 June 1980 No. 11).
Today,
then, I raise my voice from this spot with the words of
the Apostolic Exhortation Familiaris Consortio:
"Family, discover the irrepressible appeal you have
within yourself. Family, 'become' what you 'are'." Being
gathered by Word and Sacrament as a 'domestic Church',
become, like the Great Church, both teacher and mother (cf
nn. 17, 38).
You
wanted to have this meeting of ours today at the same
time as your central pilgrimage to mark the 600th
anniversary of the presence of Our Lady in her
miraculous icon at Jasna Góra.
We know what that shrine
was and is for the Polish nation.
Joining in
with your common desire which is mine also, let me evoke
the memory of the great figure of the departed Primate
of Poland, Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski. I do so at our
gathering on this, the first anniversary of his death
and funeral, of his passing from this earthly homeland,
which he steadfastly served, to his Father's Kingdom. At
our gathering here today, I do it with the love with
which all his compatriots surrounded him, both in Poland
and abroad, seeing in him a protector designated by
Providence to guide Poland through difficult times and
along new paths. Like you, I see in him a man linked by
his innermost soul to the mystery of Our Lady of
Jasna Góra
present in her children's lives and in the nation's
existence. We are all aware what the Shrine and Icon
of
Jasna Góra
have meant and still mean to our country.
Those who
left their country, whether seeking their bread or for
other reasons, bore with them the icon of
Jasna Góra
or of Ostrobrama. It was an outward sign of their faith
and their attachment to Christ and to Poland. The first
emigrants in this country, in the last century, also
brought with them the icon of Our Lady of Czestochowa,
both to Manchester and here to London. When Cardinal
Augustus Hlond consecrated the first church in Devonia Road
in London he dedicated it to the Mother of God of
Czestochowa.
During the
last war this icon was in almost all the soldiers' chapels just as pictures of it were often found
in the uniforms of Polish soldiers. Icons of our Lady of Czestochowa
are found in every church where you join in prayer,
especially to take part in a Sunday Mass. Her picture is
in almost every Polish home abroad.
The Jubilee
Year is the year for a special renewal of faith and
family life. Parents need to look to Mary to be
conscious once again of their responsibilities and their
educational tasks. Certainly many families say the
prayer of
Jasna Góra:
'Mary, Queen of Poland, I am close to you, I remember
you, I keep watch.' Let us be close to her and let us
keep watch. Let young people keep watch. I turn
especially to you, my dear young friends. Have the
courage to take on this difficult heritage called Poland and develop
it here on English soil. So many are the problems of today, so many values
which require us to keep watch, lest man obliterate
within himself, in his bonds and social relationships ,
the image and likeness of God engraved within him by the
Creator and renewed by Christ; lest he obliterates it in
himself and in
others.
It is not by
chance that our exceptional meeting today takes place on
the feast of Pentecost.
'Come, Holy
Spirit,
send to us from heaven
a ray of your light.''
Convince us
about sin, about righteousness and about judgement (cf
Jn 16:18).
Lead us into all truth (cf Jn 16:13).
Glorify Christ in us, take what is His and reveal it to
us (cf Jn 16:14)
Remind us of everything that Christ has told us (cf Jn
14:26)
Let not our heart be troubled and let it not be afraid (cf
Jn 14:27)
Our
Lady of
Jasna Góra
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