The Christ Nation, Part One: Antemurale Christianitatis

A story of the persecution and survival of the Polish Church during communist rule.

The story of this Christ-nation begins over a thousand years ago with the conversion of this agrarian people and ends in the offices of the most powerful people in the world. The pope, representing a Vatican at peak world-wide influence, and the president of the United States, at peak geopolitical consequence, when at any moment the world might well end in nuclear war – the central, significant, centrifugal, geopolitical, spiritual focus of all these energies lay withing the meager borders and daily struggles of this eastern European nation that sought, century after century to simply be itself. To exist according to its designs. To be free. To be Catholic. To be Poland. 

In researching Polish history, I decided to focus on the Soviet era for a couple reasons. It still exists in living memory and therefore can be a tangible, easy-to-grasp, and somewhat relatable story, despite its over thousand-year dance with its faith. For guides through these five decades, we have at hand a cast of characters that ranges from local hardline communists and atheist to the common priest, and all the way up to the pope himself. But first, before we can discuss what Poland was from the end of World War II to the fall of the Soviet Union, we must understand how it got there, for before it earned the reputation as the lynchpin of the Soviet Union, it was known as the Bulwark of Christendom.

Audio Source: https://tabletopaudio.com/

For show transcripts and sources, please visit gatesofhellpod.com.