Pope John Paul II and the Fall of Communism, Guide, Progetti e Ricerche di Politiche dell'Unione Europea

Scarica Pope John Paul II and the Fall of Communism e più Guide, Progetti e Ricerche in PDF di Politiche dell'Unione Europea solo su Docsity! Fatima Soualhi 20/10/2019 Historical and religious perspectives Mid-term paper Subject D. Pope John Paul II and the Fall of Communism “The transcendent hope which communism understood as an expression of human alienation became the motive force behind great acts of human liberation”1. As pointed out in this citation, religion, in this case Catholicism, played an important role in the defeat of communism, specifically in the fall of the Soviet regime. Even though the Soviet regime was a system already in crisis, the Catholic Church and John Paul II played a significant role in the way it collapsed. But what was the extent of this role? In order to better understand the Pope’s impact on the downfall of the Soviet this paper will focus mainly on the Soviet regime that was established in Poland, John Paul II native country. This essay will firstly examine how some factor other than the intervention of the Catholic Church, helped the demise of Soviet Union and how the Communist Manifesto stance on religion was wrongly interpreted by the regime. Secondly, it will mention how the past experiences of Karol Wojtyla were crucial for his role as pope. Then it will discuss the Pope’s astuteness showed during his sermons on October 22, 1978, beginning of his pontificate and June 22, 1979 at Warsaw Victory Square that will lead to the formation of the Solidarity movement which will be discussed in the last section of this paper. The Catholic Church and the papacy have played a significant role in the downfall of the Soviet Union. Nevertheless, other factors help explain the collapse of the Soviet regime: political deadlock, economic implosion, Western pressure, the USSR’s failed military campaign in Afghanistan.2 Also, the communism of the Soviet Union was a distorted version far away from the concept of communism that was shaped, in 1848, by the two political philosophers: Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels in their ‘Communist Manifesto’. In fact, in the Manifesto, Marx and Engels 1 George Wigel, The Final Revolution: The Resistance Church and the Collapse of Communism (New York, United States: Oxford University Press, 2003) 6. 2 Jonathan Luxmoore and Jolanta Babiuch. The Vatican and the Red Flag: The Struggle for the Soul of Eastern Europe. (London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1999) 4. proclaimed that the history of mankind was a history of class struggles, outlining how every civilization has existed with an oppressed working majority exploited by the oppressive, namely wealthy minority. The Manifesto would go on to lay down the rules of an ideal society, from the abolition of child labour, to free public education.3 While the ‘Communist Manifesto’ envisioned a worker’s utopia that prioritized civil liberties and an open, transparent government, the Soviet regime created instead a society where civil liberties were stripped away. Furthermore, Marx’s well-known motto that religion is 'the opium of the people' was taken in isolation supposing that Marx thought religion needed to be eradicated by force as soon as possible. 4 Hence, the attempts of Communist government to establish control over the lives of people and its ruthless hostility towards the Church.5 Marx instead believed in creating a society in which the people no longer needed the consolation of religion.6 If follows that Soviet communism, with its active oppression of religion, was a distortion of original Marxist communism. 7 But why did such an oppressive regime last so long? The answer for this question lies within different factors. First of all, communism was a radically mundane form of the hope for human regeneration through the inbreaking of Kingdom of truth and righteousness that had shaped western consciousness and culture for years.8 Here we can find how communism was able to attract and coerce millions of people over the years. 9 Secondly, the Soviet communism was a revolutionary faith that had all the elements of a traditional faith: it had a doctrine, a soteriology – a theory of salvation through revolution – and an ecclesiology – the party. It had also sacred texts – the Manifesto, Das Kapital, What Is to Be Done? All of these characteristics gave Soviet communism power in history.10 Thirdly, Soviet communism depended on complicity.11 The oppression of the regime could go on not only because of the power of police but also because of the people who 1 3 Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. The Communist Manifesto. Minneapolis, MN: First Avenue Editions, a division of Lerner Publishing Group, 2018. 4 Baggini, Julian. Atheism: A very Short Introduction. Vol. 99. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003. 87 5 Woodhead, Linda. Christianity: A very Short Introduction. New York;Oxford;: Oxford University Press, 2004. 114 6 Baggini, Julian. Atheism: A very Short Introduction, 87 7 Ibid., 87 8 Weigel, The Final Revolution: The Resistance Church and the Collapse of Communism, 193 9 Ibid., 193 10 Ibid., 12 11 Ibid., 48 obvious political significance: ‘Be not afraid’. This was a clear message to his compatriots to not lose hope. It also demonstrated his astuteness and expertise, as he used mass media to thwart the communist regime. 29 Three times during his first great sermon at his solemn installation as bishop of Rome, John Paul II repeated that call to conscience and courage and the message rang true because it was drawn from a deep well of personal experience and conviction.30 He was a pope who was uncertain in the use of the Italian language and in the accents but extremely strong in the things he said. Therefore, one could say that the election of Karol Wojtyla marked the beginning of the national awakening of Poland and the other countries that were under the Soviet regime. On June 22, 1979, John Paull II was at Warsaw’s Victory Square in front of hundreds of thousands of Poles. The message he preached was that of renewal: “Let Thy Spirit descend and renew the land, this land!”.31 It was a message that transmitted hope, strength and power because he knew, as a Polish, that that multitude he was standing in front of wanted a representative, a defender, someone that would give them visibility and the right to exist. What made his message so powerful was less the words themselves but rather how the Pope pronounced them.32 He pronounced those words in a way which exactly caught and expressed the national mood.33 John Paull II, during his journey in Poland, never intentionally talked about economics nor politics. He knew that the atmosphere in Poland was to say the least tense and that the responsibility for avoiding a violent confrontation lay with him. 34 He spoke naturally, without inhibitions because this was a pastoral visit whose aim was not to overthrow communism but to strengthen Christian life and culture. 35 He wanted for people to own the truth of their identity at the core of which lied Catholicism, he wanted people to be spiritually united. He did not need to talk about politics, saying what he said would be enough. The Polish people would draw the conclusions themselves. 36 29 Blaney, Joseph R., and Zompetti, Joseph P. The rhetoric of Pope John Paul II. (MD: Lexington Books, 2009). 162 30 Weigel, The Final Revolution: The Resistance Church and the Collapse of Communism, 77. 31 Blaney, The rhetoric of Pope John Paul II, 32 Jonathan Luxmoore and Jolanta Babiuch. The Vatican and the Red Flag, 216 33 Ibid., 216 34 Ibid., 214 35 Ibid., 214 36 Ibid., 214 ‘For many people in Poland and beyond its borders, listening to the Pope has posed a moral obligation to start and intensify a struggle in defense of rights’37. The Pope's visit had left its mark. The trip had placed the spiritual premises in the Polish people for a redemption from oppression and for the recognition of fundamental human rights. It was clear by then that communism had its days numbered. The communist regime failed to understand that through his preaching the Pope was instilling in people the dangerous seed of freedom and how his own bold presence brought hidden energies to the surface. Had the Soviet regime studied wisely his words and gestures it could have imagined the visit’s potential social impact. 38 The regime did everything to minimize the Pope's visit, but it was not able to censor his strong voice that asks the Polish nation, as a Catholic nation, to witness its faith, to take its destiny in hand. This is precisely what happened in the next years when the birth of an independent worker union, Solidarity (Solidarność), would put in crisis the regime's claim to be able to govern Polish society. The Solidarity movement set a perfect example for a revolution that could be both self- regulating and non-violent.39 The Pope had in fact two wishes for Solidarity: that it should persevere in the search for justice ‘calmly, persistently and fruitfully’; and it should always show ‘the same courage’ combined with ‘the same circumspection and moderation’. 40 As a consequence, the first worker’s revolution in history was a peaceful one and it was born under the blessing of the Pope John Paul II. Even when the Solidarity movement suffered suppression under the martial law, for the Pope, it was precisely out of grief that new life emerges, as Christ taught in his preaching and lived out through his passion, death, and resurrection.41 But the Solidarity movement survived the martial law and became even stronger forcing Poland’s Communist Party to sign an agreement that legitimized the labor movement as a political party. This agreement set the stage for the June 1989 elections, which drove Solidarity into power and ended Poland’s communist era.42 1 37 Ibid., 215 38 Ibid., 217 39 Weigel, The Final Revolution: The Resistance Church and the Collapse of Communism, 139 40 Jonathan Luxmoore and Jolanta Babiuch. The Vatican and the Red Flag, 230 41 Felak, James Ramon. Pope John Paul II, the Saints, and Communist Poland: The Papal Pilgrimages of 1979 and 1983. The Catholic Historical Review 100, no. 3 (2014): 555-574. 42 Perrone, Arragon. (2012). Pope John Paul II’s Role in the Collapse of Poland’s Communist Regime: Examining a Religious Leader’s Impact on International Relations. 15 To sum up, it is true that the Catholic Church and the Papacy played a big role in the demise of the Soviet Union but the basis for the fall was already there. As the Pope himself stated: ‘The tree was already rotten. I just gave it a good shake and the rotten apples fell’43. It can be argued then that John Paul II knew that the regime would finally fall and that it was just a matter of time. His merit lies in the fact that that fall happened without bloodshed, something that had had no precedents. 43 Stephen Engelberg. “The Vatican sanction”, nytimes.con [online], September 29, 1996 [consulted October 15, 2019]. https://www.nytimes.com/1996/09/29/books/the-vatican-sanction.html