His address in the Sejm had a lofty, almost triumphant character. John Paul II summed up the difficult Polish path from the fall of the Commonwealth of Poland in the 18th century to the Third Republic of Poland, emphasizing the great role Solidarity had played in Poland’s liberation. “We are all aware that this meeting in the Parliament would be impossible without the determined resistance offered by Polish workers in Pomerania in memorable August 1980. It would be impossible without Solidarity, which chose a path of a peaceful struggle to defend human rights and rights of the entire nation.”

The Pope also gave advice and warnings for the future: “Jointly rejoicing at the positive transformations taking place in Poland before our eyes, we should also realize that in a free society there must be values ensuring the highest good of man as a whole. The objective of any economic changes should be to shape a more humane and just world. I would like to wish Polish politicians and all people engaged in the public life to not spare efforts to build a state which takes special care of the family, human life, and education of the young generation, one that respects man’s right to work, sees issues important for the entire nation, and is sensitive to the needs of the individual, particularly of the poor and weak one.”

John Paul II’s address was strongly applauded by almost all of the assembled, from the right-wing politicians to representatives of the post-communist left. The Pope’s visit to the Parliament was the largest manifestation of joy at regained freedom after 1989 and a moment of the Holy Father’s triumph as a spiritual and political leader of the nation. The exclamation “Long live the king, the nation, and all the states” with which he finished his address and which dates back to the adoption of the Third May Constitution was a humorous verbalization of the leadership role which Karol Wojtyła had played in the life of the Polish nation since the 1978 conclave, when he was elected the head of the Catholic Church.

Poland’s communist authorities viewed the election of Cardinal Karol Wojtyła with consternation. They realised they could not refuse John Paul II (the name Wojtyła took as pope) permission to come to Poland – even though in 1966 the authorities of the People’s Republic of Poland had twice refused to allow Pope Paul VI to enter the country.

John Paul II’s visit to Poland took place from June 2-10, 1979, with hundreds of thousands of people gathered at every ceremony. The presence of the Polish Pope and his speeches, whose depth and beautiful language contrasted sharply with the poverty and hypocrisy of communist propaganda, set in motion a true revolution by giving expression to the freedom-seeking aspirations of the Poles and of the Church in Poland, both stifled under communist rule. During his first pilgrimage to Poland, the Pope visited Kraków, Częstochowa, and the museum at the former German concentration camp at Auschwitz, among many other places.

Particularly important was the first mass John Paul II celebrated, at Victory Square in downtown Warsaw (today, Marshal Józef Piłsudski Square). During that mass, the Pope delivered a homily offering a philosophical vision of Poland’s history and a programme for moral renewal. The Victory Square mass was later recognised as the symbolic beginning of the changes that led to the emergence of Solidarity in 1980 and the eventual downfall of communism. The final words of the homily reverberate in Poland to this very day: “Let thy Spirit descend! And make anew the face of Earth. Here on Earth.”

In this difficult situation for the Polish Catholic Church, Stefan Wyszyński, a young, 46-year-old bishop from Lublin, took the post of the Archbishop of Warsaw and Gniezno and at the same time the Primate of Poland and President of the Polish Episcopate in 1948. He had received legal education in the past and was particularly interested in Catholic social teaching and the lives of workers before the Second World War. With the aim of maintaining certain freedoms for the Church, Wyszyński led to an agreement between the Episcopate and the communist authorities concluded on 14 April 1950.

Even though the authorities signed the document, they did not change their anti-religious politics. When Wyszyński was appointed a cardinal by Pope Pius XII in 1952, the official press attacked him for his alleged anti-Polish attitude and politics. Some of the representatives of the communist authorities came up with the idea of arresting the Archbishop. On 9 February 1953, the authorities announced a decree on filling ecclesiastical positions, which allowed them to interfere in the administration sphere of the Church. This step caught Cardinal Wyszyński and the Episcopate by surprise. The Primate tried to influence the content of the document through negotiations but met with the authorities’ refusal, which forced him to write the famous Non possumus (Latin for “we cannot”) statement.

The document was written on 8 May 1953 but was not announced. Several days later, it was handed over to Bolesław Bierut, the Chair of the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers’ Party and the de facto leader of the state. In his letter, Cardinal Wyszyński summarised the relations between the State and the Church, emphasised the breaches of the 1950 Agreement and asserted that the Catholic clergy was open to dialogue as long as the fundamental rights of the congregation were respected.

Primate Wyszyński was arrested several months later, in September 1953. He spent in total 3 years in isolation in various places of Poland for his objection to the politics of the communist rulers. Wyszyński was released only after Władysław Gomułka came to power as the First Secretary of the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers’ Party in October 1956.