In Poland, confidence in the Catholic Church in free fall
It was the decision of the Polish Constitutional Court to almost completely ban abortion that triggered this wave of disaffection with the Catholic Church.
REUTERS - YVES HERMAN
Text by: Sarah Bakaloglou Follow
6 min
More and more Poles are asking for apostasy as a sign of protest.
This movement of public renunciation of the Catholic faith, triggered by the decision of the Constitutional Court to ban abortion almost entirely in the country, reflects the crisis facing the Polish Church.
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From our correspondent in Warsaw,
Two weeks ago, Marta, a 33-year-old Polish woman, finally achieved what she had wanted to do for several years: leave the Catholic Church.
"
I had known for a long time that I wanted to ask for apostasy, but I imagine that I needed a little encouragement,
" smiles the young woman.
She became one of some 10,000 members of the
Apostasie2020
group
on Facebook, created at the end of October to share testimonials and advice on this procedure.
Following the
decision of the Constitutional Court on October 22 to ban abortion
in the event of a serious malformation of the fetus in a country where the law was already very restrictive, searches in Poland on the Google search engine for the word "
apostasy
Exploded.
Since that date, the country has been shaken by an unprecedented wave of protest against the government led by the conservative Law and Justice (PiS) party, in power since 2015. “
The only things we have been able to do are demonstrate and demand the apostasy,
”explains Marta, for whom this decision on abortion was a trigger because of the pressure from the Catholic Church in favor of this ban.
“
I have always considered religion to be in the private domain,
adds the young woman,
but I realize that it is an argument used by the Church to justify its interference in politics by saying:
'
we participate because 92 % of Poles are Catholic
. "
I don't want to belong to this statistic!
"
Anger against pedophilia scandals
In a Poland where the Catholic Church is powerful, the list of grievances of those who want to leave it is long.
"
I am opposed to its proximity to the government, to this outpouring of hatred against the LGBT community, and I cannot accept that the
Church covers pedophile priests
"
,
summarizes Natalia, a young woman of 28 years old who has started his apostasy process.
In recent years, shocking documentaries on pedophilia scandals in the Church have shaken Polish public opinion.
"
This context is very important to explain this movement of apostasy today, and this distrust of the
Catholic Church in Poland, but also in the world
", analyzes the sociologist of religions Marcin Zwierzdzyinski.
A mistrust accentuated by the alliance between the Law and Justice Party (PiS) in power since 2015 and the Polish Church.
Last month, a group of Catholics, including priests and laity, called on the episcopate to distance itself from the government.
For Marcin Zwierzdzyinski, “
this reflects two dimensions in the Polish Church, that of an episcopate ally of the powerful, and the community of the faithful which is tired of being politicized
”
.
According to a recent poll, only 9% of young Polish people today say they have a positive image of the Church and confidence in the institution has fallen by 18% since 2016 among the population.
“
It's also a question of generation,”
explains Marta.
My parents have always had a positive approach to the Church for her participation in the fight against communism and in the support she lavished on the people at that time.
"
Finding your place at the end of communism
In Poland, the fall of communism in 1989 was a fundamental step in the construction of the identity of the Catholic Church.
“
At that time, the Church had great difficulty in finding its place
, explains Marcin Zwierzdzyinski, because“
its identity was built in opposition to this non-religious environment
:
the
Church provided an alternative to the population in the form of faith, it had an integrating function.
"
According to the researcher, “
in this new environment of freedom after 1989, democracy and the relationship between the
State and the Church, the latter has found its place in the public and political sphere.
"
But the Catholic institution is struggling today to offer an alternative that appeals to young Poles: religion courses - in theory optional and provided in all Polish public schools - are moreover one of the reasons given by those who ask for apostasy to explain their distancing from the Catholic Church.
Schools do not always have teachers to provide ethics lessons, which are supposed to be the alternative, and social pressure is holding back some parents who wish to withdraw their children from catechism lessons.
Financed by the Polish state and taught by religious or lay people, "the
content of these courses and the very formal way of teaching them is no longer appropriate for today's world
", underlines Marcin Zwierzdzyinski
.
Classes Natalia still remembers: “
Our teacher scared us with every lesson,”
she recalls.
She told us, for example, that contraception is the greatest of sins and that we would go to hell if we used it.
She also told us that if a woman used an IUD, her child would be born with an IUD in her head.
"
The Church, between denial and recognition
The 28-year-old now hopes to be able to conclude the apostasy procedure as soon as possible.
When her mother went to get her baptismal certificate, the head of the parish assured her that Natalia was possessed by the demon and that this movement of apostasy among young people was due to "
the lack of morality of the parents
".
Asked by RFI about the loss of confidence in the Catholic Church, especially young people, the spokesperson for the Polish episcopate assures to see "
a great involvement of the youth in the life of the community of the
Church.
"Before admitting that"
this decline in confidence must be taken seriously into account and that the institution must be absolutely transparent.
"
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