POLISH NATIONAL CATHOLIC CHURCH CELEBRATES CENTENNIAL
by Helen BuckleyEditor's note: This tract, provided by Rev. Dr. Robert Niznik, Pastor of Saint Mary's Parish in St. Petersburg, Florida, is excerpted from "The Polish National Catholic Church of American Origin"
The stirring story of the Polish National Catholic Church of America and Canada, member of the National Council of Churches, is one of irrepressible freedom. It is a story of belated Reformation with all the conflict and struggle that marked that phase of Church history, taking place in the 20th century on American shores.
The Polish National Catholic Church was not founded in Poland, but in the United States of America. From the U.S. missionaries went back to Poland to establish branches of this independent "national" church.
Though still an infant in the Christian world, this Church had phenomenal growth. From 1897 with little money but great enthusiasm, 162 local churches have been organized in this country to date. In most of them three services are held on Sunday to serve a membership of 272,082. Also, before communism cut off the diocese in Poland in 1951, parishes in that country numbered 122.
The drama began in the 9th century when Cyril and Methodius brought Christianity from Constantinople to the scattered Slavic peoples giving them their first Slavic alphabet, translating the Scriptures for them into the common language, and conducting worship in that tongue. Thus, Christianity was accepted by the Slavic people as a national religion, a Church of a people united by language and a spirit of brotherhood.
In the year 965, when Otto the Great had already incorporated other Slavic nations into the Holy Roman Empire, the Poles accepted Roman Catholicism in an attempt to ward off one pretext for German intervention. Their Slavic liturgy was soon replaced by Latin services. This and other encroachments stirred them to seek independence when the Reformation was stirring in other lands. But the tide was stemmed and with the dismemberment of Poland and alien rule, many Poles fled to other countries.
An increasing stream of immigrants poured into the United States until nearly a million Poles resided there in the decade preceding World War I. They brought with them their religious fervor, their dream of freedom and sought to recreate the community life they had known in the homeland. There the parish was the center of everything, where they not only prayed with family, relatives and neighbors, but where "they participated in community activities and festivals and sung music half-popular, half-liturgical, the beautiful Christmas carols, the kolenda, and tragic Gorzkie Zale lamentations in memory of Christ's passion. In the U.S. as in Poland, the Church was an integral part of daily life.
At the turn of the century there were nearly 200 Polish parishes scattered throughout the U.S. The demand for new parishes outstripped the Roman Catholic Church's willingness or ability to create them. There were no Polish bishops and the Poles said the Irish-German hierarchy had little concern for their welfare. They saw themselves relegated to second class membership with no rights, only obligations.
They could not establish a church of their own without securing the bishop's approval and they had to accept the pastor he appointed. When the houses of worship they had erected in the new country through toil and sacrifice were declared to be the sole possession of the bishops of he various dioceses, they were outraged. They particularly resented orders to give up teaching the Polish language and culture in their parish schools.
Discontent blazed into open revolt and mass upheavals took place in numerous Polish communities, among them Chicago, Buffalo and Cleveland, as well as smaller communities in New England and New Jersey.
In Scranton, Pa., a parish delegation of Polish anthracite miners and factory workers, who made up the congregation of the large and imposing Sacred Heart Church to which they had contributed hard-earned funds, requested lay representation in parish affairs. They were refused. A group then tried to block entrance of the priest into the Church. The diocesan bishop called the police and a riot developed. Fifty-two persons were arrested.
Within weeks, the alienated groups organized a new parish and a few months later purchased land for a new church. They invited a young Polish-born priest, Father Francis Hodur, who had already endeared himself by participating in social work, publishing one of the first parish newspapers and otherwise showing his concern for their welfare, to accept leadership of their flock. It was a fateful decision for him and he knew it. On the evening of Sunday, March 14th, 1897, he came to Scranton, attended a meeting of the alienated group and took charge of the parish and on March 21st, 1897, he celebrated Mass in the basement of the unfinished structure that was to become St. Stanislaus, mother Church of the new movement. Two hundred fifty families formally united with the new parish.
Scarcely five months later the movement leaped beyond Scranton and began its march through the Pennsylvania anthracite fields. Other dissident groups turned to Scranton for guidance. In April 1897, Father Hodur, a believer in the power of the press, started a weekly paper and in it poured out advice and encouragement. In February 1898, he went to Rome and sought recognition of American-Polish problems, which he could not get from the American hierarchy. He was unsuccessful and the result was complete severance between Scranton and Rome. Father Hodur read the document to his congregation, then burned it and threw the ashes into the brook below the hill on which St. Stanislaus Cathedral stands. To the tolling of bells, people sang, prayed aloud, embraced each other and started their "new, free and dangerously expendable life."
On Christmas Eve, 1900, the walls of St. Stanislaus Church resounded for the first time to Mass sung in the Polish language. Other Polish parishes followed suit.
Mass facing the people was introduced by Bishop Hodur on the third Sunday of June, 1931 in St. Stanislaus Cathedral. This practice is continued in the Mother Cathedral Parish at Scranton and has spread throughout the Church.
In September, 1904, the first Synod of the new Polish National Catholic Church was held in Scranton with 147 clerical and lay delegates representing two dozen parishes and 20,000 adherents in five states. Father Hodur was chosen Bishop-elect and administrator of the new Church. People believed in him. They saw he was a true man of God. The Latin service books were ordered translated into Polish.
A seminary was established in 1907 now known as the Savonarola Theological Seminary to prepare men for the priesthood of the Church.
In 1908, a fraternal society was established -- Spojnia -- also known as the Polish National Union of America, a sister organization of the Church, its purpose being to serve the insurance needs of the communicants of the Church. Spojnia also carries extensive social, educational and humanitarian activities, gives financial aid to many students and youth organizations and has published countless numbers of parish school books. A large dairy farm was purchased in 1929, located at Waymart, Pa, containing 450 acres of land. It maintains a home for the aged, a children's camp and an extensive youth activity area. Spojnia owns its own printing plant where it publishes its own weekly newspaper, Straz (The Guard) prints the official organ of the Church, Rola Boza (God's Field), the women's publication, Polka, plus doing commercial job printing in addition to prayer books, catechism and all other printed material needed in the Church and Spojnia. A 600 acre tract of land called "Warsaw Village" located in Thomhurst, Pa., in the famed Pocono Mountains, by virtue of dedication to the Church, was bequeathed by the late Mrs. Josephine Walentynowicz (Valentine) in ApriI 1943. It contains summer cottages and is used as a vacation spot.
In the spirit of promoting Christian unity throughout the world, the Vatican has recently ruled that members of the Polish National Church may receive the Sacraments of Penance, Holy Communion, and the Annointing of the Sick from Roman Catholic priests. Recognition of the Polish National Catholic Church sacraments means that for Roman Catholics, according to Paragraph 2 of Canon 844 - "Whenever necessity requires or genuine spiritual advantage suggests, and provided that the danger of error or indifferentism is avoided, it is lawful for the faithful for whom it is physically or morally impossible to approach a Catholic minister, to receive the sacraments of penance, Eucharist, and anointing of the sick from non-Catholic ministers in whose churches these sacraments are valid."
From: Polish Heritage, Summer, 1997, Vol. XLVIII, No. 2
Published Quarterly by the American Council for Polish Culture