Poland Restores Legal Status to Catholic Church

WARSAW —  Parliament today overwhelmingly passed a law giving the Roman Catholic Church legal status in Poland for the first time since the communist takeover in 1944.

The law made Poland the first East Bloc country to reach a formal reconciliation with the Catholic Church and closed an era of confrontation in which the church became a powerful center of resistance to communist rule.

Church officials said they expect an agreement by early fall making Poland the first country in the bloc to establish full diplomatic relations with the Vatican.

‘Legal Recognition’

“The church has waited years for legal recognition of its rights and it has finally been passed in a shape which makes both the church and believers happy,” said Jacek Ambroziak, legal adviser to Poland’s bishops.

“The new law has removed room for possible conflicts,” he said.

Communist leader Gen. Wojciech Jaruzelski was one of 306 deputies of the Sejm, or Parliament, who voted for the law. Two voted against and 12 abstained. Not all 460 members of the Sejm were present.

The Sejm also passed two other laws, establishing freedom of worship for all creeds and bringing the country’s estimated 62,000 clergy into the state social security service.

The law establishes the church’s right to build churches, teach religion and establish and run Catholic schools.

It also restores church property--including buildings, hospitals and land--confiscated in the 1950s after Soviet dictator Josef Stalin installed communist rule in 1944.

And it grants the church the right to broadcast Sunday Mass and religious programs, set up radio and television stations and publish newspapers and books.

“The bill cancels the ‘non-personality’ of the church in the legal sense,” Ambroziak said.

Church-state relations have been marked by bitter conflicts since World War II. Hundreds of priests were arrested at the height of Stalinism in 1950 and religious education for children was stopped.