The Pope Should Defrock "Father" Rydzyk

Its time for the Pope to get rid of Father Rydzyk. Its as simple as that. The latest ugly statements for which Rydzyk is being criticized are not a rare occurrence, they are part of a long standing "tradition." The Pope must decide whether this part media baron/part priest should be the face of Catholicism in Poland, a devoutly Catholic country.

According to the Stephen Roth Center for the Study of Contemporary Anti-Semitism and Racism, the main disseminator of antisemitic propaganda in Poland is the Catholic-nationalist Radio Maryja), founded and run by Father Tadeusz Rydzyk, which frequently features antisemitic broadcasts. About 4 percent of Polish society are regular listeners.

...anti-Semitism remains an active phenomenon in Polish society. Research conducted by Warsaw University sociologists revealed that the proportion of Poles who subscribe to “strong” anti-Semitic views doubled in the period 1992-2002 from 8 percent to 16 percent. According to Professor Ireneusz Krzeminski, the rise in anti-Semitic attitudes can be attributed to the increased presence of anti-Semitic discourse in the public sphere, not least through Radio Maryja......

In several instances, anti-Semitic comments have been made by listeners during interactive shows – a fact often mentioned by Radio Maryja’s defenders, who believe that the station cannot be held responsible for what callers say on the air. However, there are many examples of program hosts and their invited guests making similar remarks. Rydzyk himself has routinely referred to Polish State Television as “TELAVision”, suggesting it is dominated by Jews. On August 20, 2002 Rydzyk openly degraded the Jewish religion on air: “I call it ‘ai vai shalom’. It is clearly a religion of trade. It is trade, and not religion.” He personally warned against a non-existent plan to bring about the immigration of a few hundred thousand Israelis to Poland (April 30, 2002, June 4, 2002, February 19, 2003).

Antoni Macierewicz, a close political ally of Rydzyk, and now Deputy Minister of National Defense, said in a broadcast on July 19, 2002 (in response to a listener’s question about the notorious Tsarist forgery, “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion”): “I read it, it is very interesting, some say it is authentic, some say it’s not, I am not a specialist. Experience shows that there are such groups in Jewish circles.” Zygmunt Wrzodak, a radical MP elected on the LPF ticket, has been another fre quent guest. On April 15, 2002, he declared in a broadcast: “It is known that the European Union is controlled by freemasonry (...) and the interest is the following: to empower both these nations a global Jewish nation and a European German
nation.”

In a September 2002 article written for Nasz Dziennik and repeatedly aired on Radio Maryja, Czeslaw Bartnik, a priest and professor at the Catholic University of Lublin, claimed: “Somebody warned all the Jews working in the twin towers and did not warn all the other employees.”

In March 2006, the commentator Stanislaw Michalkiewicz declared on air: “Jews have humiliated Poland internationally by demanding money... Kikes sneak up behind us to try to oblige our government to pay them money on the pretext of these demands.”Such statements are very much in keeping with the views of Father Tadeusz Rydzyk, the power behind the station, who has stated on-air that Judaism is a “trade, not a religion.” all of the above comes from ADL-Poland: Democracy and the Challenge of Extremism)

Of course there is the latest offense the Polish weekly "Wprost" published excerpts from a lecture Rydzyk allegedly delivered at a journalism school he established in the central Polish city of Torun, where Radio Maryja is headquartered. In the lecture, Rydzyk was quoted as criticizing Kaczynski, the president, for bowing to pressure to compensate people — many of them Jews — for property nationalized by the postwar communist government, and for donating land for a future Jewish museum when Kaczynski was Warsaw's mayor. "You know that it's about Poland giving US$65 billion dollars" to the Jews, Rydzyk reportedly said. "They will come to you and say: give me your coat. Take off your pants. Give me your shoes."

I am no theologian (nor do I play one on TV) but from what I have learned from my Catholic friends, the hateful speech made on this bastard's radio station (by him and others) goes against their beliefs that Jesus taught of love thy neighbor, do unto others,etc.

It was only seven years ago that Pope John Paul II went to Holocaust memorial Yad Vashem in Israel and touched the holiest shrine of the Jewish people, the Western Wall in Jerusalem. He placed in the Western Wall a prayer that read, "God of our fathers, you chose Abraham and his descendants to bring your name to the nations. We are deeply saddened by the behavior of those who, in the course of history, have caused these children of yours to suffer."

On that same vist, the Pope also went to the Holocaust Memorial at Yad Vashem. He said there, "As Bishop of Rome and successor of the Apostle Peter, I assure the Jewish people that the Catholic Church, motivated by the Gospel law of truth and love and by no political considerations, is deeply saddened by the hatreds, acts of persecution and displays of anti-Semitism directed against the Jews by Christians at any time and in any place."

I believe that John Paul II's successor feel the same way about Anti-Semitism as his predecessor. Therefore it is time for him to put tuchas afen tish (sorry I don't know the Latin translation). Pope Benedict XVI has a great opportunity to teach the world a lesson. He need to stand up and announce that Tadeusz Rydzyk's hatred is not allowed in the Catholic Church and from here on out that mean spirited SOB is no longer a priest. What do you say Pope? Its Now or Never.

Israel Urges Condemnation of Priest
By VANESSA GERA 07.30.07, 1:45 PM ET

WARSAW, Poland -

Israel is urging Polish and Roman Catholic authorities to condemn a prominent priest over reported anti-Jewish comments, which its ambassador described Monday as the worst case of anti-Semitic speech in Poland in decades.

The Rev. Tadeusz Rydzyk, who runs a conservative media empire that includes the Catholic station Radio Maryja, was allegedly caught on tape suggesting that Jews are greedy and Polish President Lech Kaczynski is subservient to Jewish lobbies.

The remarks allegedly were made in the spring, but they only surfaced this month in the weekly magazine Wprost. Rydzyk himself has rejected accusations of anti-Semitism and said he "didn't intend to offend anyone."

Israel's ambassador to Poland, David Peleg, said the statements mark a setback in the progress Poland has made toward Jewish-Catholic reconciliation and in fighting anti-Semitism since the fall of Communism. He said extensive diplomatic efforts were under way to persuade Warsaw to condemn the priest.

"I think that this is the strongest anti-Semitic remark here in Poland since 1968," Peleg told The Associated Press. "We hope that the government, on one hand, and the Catholic church, on the other hand, will make a statement condemning this anti-Semitic remark."

Peleg has asked the office of Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski, as well as the foreign and justice ministries, to take action.

"I definitely think that one of the aims of Father Rydzyk is to damage the very important dialogue which Catholics and Jews have developed," Peleg said, adding that he would also meet Tuesday with a bishop in Lublin in charge of Jewish-Catholic dialogue.

So far, Poland's leaders have withheld comment, saying they were waiting to see if the tapes were authentic.

But the Rome-based Redemptorists - the missionary order to which Rydzyk belongs - supported him last week in Nasz Dziennik, a daily newspaper that belongs to Rydzyk's media empire.

"Concerning the content of the 'tapes,' which bear signs of compilation, Father Tadeusz Rydzyk does not confirm the anti-Semitic attitude ascribed to him. And as his brothers who know him, we know that such an attitude is alien to him," the order's chief representative in Poland, the Rev. Zdzislaw Klafka, wrote in a statement printed on the paper's front page.

Klafka also called Wprost's report a "serious provocation" and said it has a history of offending Catholics.

The tapes also allegedly called the nation's first lady, Maria Kaczynska, a "witch" for supporting abortion rights and say she should be euthanized for that stance.