When a Dutch journalist claimed to have found documents indicating that Pope John Paul II covered up clergy sexual abuse while serving as the archbishop of Krakow, Poland, in the 1960s and ’70s, it sparked a predictable media frenzy in Europe’s most Catholic country.With some urging a consideration of the evidence, and others dismissing the claims out of hand, the incident appears to highlight a continuing gulf between the Polish church and its Western neighbors.
“We face serious problems here whenever issues like this arise, since it’s impossible to have any serious debate about the pope,” Malgorzata Glabisz-Pniewska, a senior Catholic presenter with Polish Radio, told NCR.
“Some people, partly for political reasons, attack him, hoping to discredit his claims to sanctity, while others insist any criticism is inherently satanic,” she said. “It’s a situation St. John Paul himself would not have appreciated.”