The kingdom of God is not sociology

Stanisław Gądecki is well recognised for his views echoing beyond his homeland as well. He has become famous –amongst others- for his uncompromising interviews with a strong opinion on the society, politics and the Church. The Archbishop of Poznan stands against everything that is about worldliness, and encourages to follow Christ only, instead of living as to the current political and ideological trends.

Politics divides, faith unites

“The Church has to return to his identity. It must not take on a secular spirit. Many times we believe that the culture we are living in is steadfast, immortal and will never change. (…) It is God who is the lord of history, and not the powerful like leaders. It is the system that should be turned to relative, rather than the Church. If we believe that political systems are steadfast or immortal, the Church is going to weaken” – emphasized the Archbishop. He highlighted the need of an inter-religious unity, thereby making it difficult for the politicians to ruin the inter-religious peace. “Politics divides, but we do our best to unite religious people across the globe, and would like to assure people of other faith or of religious minorities that they can live safely with us, while developing their own culture as well.”

Becoming a slave on free will

The Archbishop speaks about the hard times the Church is currently going through. Just for sustaining its existence the Church was almost about to give up his identity. The pressure is huge, since everything is acceptable, except for the Christianity.

“The problem of our days is that massive changes have occurred across the world. A couple of decades ago religious thoughts were almost forced on people, while nowadays another culture has been pressed on them, all at once trickily triggering the desire for it. Pleasure has become the purpose of life, everything is moving into this direction, and even if people are not enslaved, they are still becoming slaves on their free will.

The Church is alive

Stanisław Gądecki aims at promoting the Christian-Jewish dialogue as well. “Remembrance has an important role in the Judaism, and Christian remembrance must also find its own place” – said the Archbishop of Poznan. It is more than 20 years by now that the day of Judaism has been introduced for the day prior to the ecumenical week of prayer, while the day of Islam has been recently set for the day ensuing the week of prayer.

In 2016, the Chief Pastor, in cooperation with the Polish Caritas, joined the program “From family to family”, wherein the Polish Diocese took care of more than 1,100 Syrian families. Moreover, Archbishop Gadecki personally paid a visit to Syria. In connection with the International Eucharistic Congress, he said: “The Congress intends to present the most important element of the Church. The Church exists when the Eucharist exists: This is a top priority of the many thousands topics, on which a conference could be organised. Organising this Congress well proves that the Church is very much alive. (…). Politics are based on sociology, and many times the Church itself as well. Yet, the Kingdom of God is not sociology.”

Photo/Source: IEC