Conscientious Resistance: Communism and Catholicism in Cold War Poland, 1945-1989

Abstract

This thesis will explore the diplomatic relationship between the Soviet-backed, Communist government of Poland and the Roman Catholic Church from the end of World War II until the fall of the Soviet Union in 1989. First, I will discuss the Church's approach to the idea of religious liberty, beginning in the Second Vatican Council. Then, the Church's foreign policy position toward the Soviet Union and their satellites during the Cold War known as the Ostpolitik, will be discussed. Secondly, I will explain how the Polish Church was able to act as a resistance force against Polish Communism leading to 1978. Thirdly, I will evaluate the changes in the Communist-Vatican diplomatic relationship, as well as changes within Poland such as the rise of the Solidarity movement which coincided with the election of the Polish Cardinal Archbishop Karol Wojtyla as Pope John Paul II in 1978. Lastly, I will show how these events helped contribute to the fall of Communism in Eastern Europe in 1989. I will show how a non-governmental, non-political, social actor, the Catholic Church, both in Rome and in Poland, was able to act as a formidable resistance force in the fight against Communism, contributing greatly to Communism's demise.