VATICAN II AND POLAND 165alistic, given the facts. Respecting some agreements is in the inter-
est even of the Communist regime. After the First Session of the
Council, there was a moment when the government was disposed
toward a concordat or the establishment of certain diplomatic rela-
tions. But, in effect, the cardinal behaved in such a manner that the
government soon stiffened. The Polish Church in general remains
very constantinian. 116
When one scratches beneath the surface of the Polish bish-
ops’ story, it becomes a tale of prelates trying to overcome re-
sentment: not only against the Communists, but also against the
Holy See. As Jan Grootaers has noted, in the battle for religious
freedom, this issue “constituted a separate front: that of recur-
ring tensions between the Polish bishops’ conference and repre-
sentatives of the Vatican each time the latter entered into direct
negotiations with the Polish government without including the
relevant bishops.”117
Seen in this light, it becomes clear that Vatican II’s signifi-
cance for the Soviet Bloc has been largely misunderstood by ex-
isting scholarship. Rather than ignore populations walled off by
an Iron Curtain, the Council created a unique transnational space
for intellectual and political interaction and debate involving
Communists, Iron Curtain Catholics (clergy and laity alike), and
émigrés—of which Poland offered perhaps the most vibrant case,
though hardly the only one.118
Christian Democratic émigrés, in particular, played the semi-
nal role of facilitators. Supported by funds originating from
the Free Europe Committee and the United States Information
Agency, these “last men standing” for the Polish Christian La-
- “Diarium Jan Grootaers,” 1893–94; underlining in the original.
- Grootaers, Actes et acteurs à Vatican II, 327.
- It is therefore inaccurate to present—as does, for example, Piotr Rutkows-
ki—the Polish story of Vatican II as a struggle by the bishops (especially Cardinal
Wyszyński) against the putatively aligned forces of the Polish Communists and Cath-
olic lay activists; Rutkowski, Polscy biskupi jako ojcowie Soboru Watykańskiego II, 171.