Society-politics
Fr. JAROSŁAW GRABOWSKI
A simple but also a significant gesture of sprinkling ashes on heads started our Great Lent. In the Lent preface we find significant words: ‘Almighty God, You through the carnal Lent reduce defects, raise the spirit…’ In the difficult times of war when lots of people were forced to starve, one could feel an irony in these words, because there was a belief that the Lent takes away freedom from the man. »
OLD-TESTAMENT ANNOUNCEMENTS OF EUCHARIST
Fr. JACEK MOLKA
The holy mass is the perfect form of a prayer and the culmination point of liturgy. Its establishment is described in the New Testament; whereas it is announced by many texts of the Old Testament. Let’s have a look at some of them »
15 YEARS OF THE VALIDITY OF THE CONCORDAT
Fr. WOJCIECH GÓRALSKI
Concordat is a solemn agreement between the Holy See and a state, serving to harmonious arrangement of relations between them »
Prelate priest Ireneusz Skubiś talks with cardinal Stanisław Dziwisz
PONTIFICATE OF ESSENTIAL FAITH
Prelate priest Ireneusz Skubiś talks with the archbishop senior Alfons Nossol from Opole – a friend of Benedict XVI
SALT OF THE EARTH
JAN MARIA JACKOWSKI
Blessed John Paul II had already warned over 20 years ago against the dangers of the contemporary democracy. In the encyclical ‘Centesimus annus’ published in 1991he wrote: ‘Today it is usually stated that the philosophy and an attitude convenient for democratic forms of politics are agnosticism and skeptical relativism, whereas those who feel convinced that they know the truth, and are definitely following it, are not, from the democratic point of view... »
WE DO NOT MEAN THIS KIND OF EUROPE
Fr. IRENEUSZ SKUBIŚ
This confession of faith which is pronounced by the holy Roman-Catholic Church today, millions of believers express it with the mouth of the Holy Father Benedict XVI and with him. We believe in God. This faith joins us. It is also an expression of our prayer and a reference to God. God is and this is the most important for the man, so that he would not be without his resources, lonely in a crowd, without his justification. »
ANNA CICHOBŁAZIŃSKA
Among us there are no children with Down syndrome, in fact if there was a gene responsible for a psychic illness, after some time psychiatric hospitals and care houses for disabled people would be depopulated. Eugenics, reigning in the inter-war period and gathering a terrible harvest during the Second World War, in the majesty of law, took on a new form: euthanasia and abortion. »
Milena Kindziuk talks with cardinal Józef Glemp
IN THE CISTERCIANS IN WILLOW SPRINGS
Fr. STANISŁAW RABIEJ
For many people, even those who are engaged in the life of Christian Church, the Order of Cistercians is rather associated with the life behind the monastery walls, where one can hear a liturgy prayer celebrated from the early morning to the evening. This picture can be also enriched with compulsory silence and agrarian work or writing-editorial work so that ‘ora et labora’ would be not only a beautiful calling from the far past. »
Włodzimierz Rędzioch talks with professor Valentina Colombo
The revolutions, which have been touching the countries of the Northern Africa and the Middle East, were caused by a desire of freedom and justice. The ‘Arabic spring’ was also associated with much hope for democratization of this part of the world. Unfortunately, with time passing, there are more doubts about using the regained freedom – will it be useful in creating democratic countries or will it rather be used to introduce totalitarian regimes, the Islamic ones this time, where the law of Sharia will be obliging. »
CHILDREN WITHOUT ANY CHANCE FOR LIFE
IWONA GALIŃSKA
In Polish hospitals, not including private surgeries, in the years 1956-85, as a result of abortion, 36 million children were killed. This period was a paradise of abortion. »
DAY OF A MIGRANT AND A REFUGEE
Fr. Wiesław Wójcik, Director of the Institute of Emigration Pastoral
The Holy Father Benedict XVI suggested reflecting on the following issue on the 99th World Day of a Migrant and a Refugee: ‘Migrations – a pilgrimage of faith and hope’. How important this contemporary phenomenon is for 215 million people living away from their homes, but also important it is for their relatives and families and the whole emigration pastoral ministry. 2 million our compatriots have left Poland recently. »
‘THE STORY OF KOWALSKI FAMILY’
ANNA JANOWSKA
The film ‘The story of Kowalski family’ – whose projection took place on 14 January this year in the auditorium of the editorial office of the ‘Sunday’, is based on authentic events from before 70 years. This is a story about inhabitants of Ciepielów near Radom, inhabited by the Polish-Jewish community living in harmony for ages. During the Nazis occupation German gendarmes committed a macabre crime there: on 6 December 1942, in one of houses, 34 people were set on fire alive – these were Polish families with children and Jews who were hidden by Poles. »
HISTORICAL MOBILIZATION IN THE DEFENCE OF NORMALITY
Fr. Martin de la Ronciere
In the ‘Sunday’ of 9 December 2012 I described the growing movement of resistance against the planned act allowing for ‘marriage’ of the same sex couples and adopting children by them. On 17 November and 8 December 2012 the manifestations in various regions of France gathered 300 thousand people in total, half of them from Paris. At that time I was calling the readers of the ‘Sunday’ to pray, so that the mobilisation of the French for the nation-wide manifestation planned on 13 January would be ‘massive and effective’. »