From the Guardian (UK):
The Catholic church in Poland has been convulsed by claims that the priest who is due to be sworn in this weekend as Archbishop of Warsaw, one of the leading posts in the hierarchy, spied for the communist secret police.
Stanislaw Wielgus is under pressure to withdraw from Sunday's ceremony or request its postponement after Polish newspapers accused him of collaborating for two decades with a communist regime that the Catholic church staunchly opposed.
There were doubts yesterday over whether the prime minister, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, would attend the ceremony as he was due to. The prime minister campaigned with his twin brother, Poland's president, on a platform of purging ex-communists from public life.
"The new archbishop of Warsaw was a secret and conscious collaborator with the SB [Security Service] for more than 20 years. Documents confirm this," the well-respected Rzeczpospolita newspaper wrote yesterday of Mr Wielgus, who was chosen by Pope Benedict XVI last month to fill one of the most important roles in the Polish church.
Rzeczpospolita and other publications claim to have found Mr Wielgus's file in the archives of the communist secret police, which have yielded evidence exposing several prominent priests as former collaborators and led investigators to conclude that about one-in-10 Polish clergymen passed information to the security services.
And from the BBC:
Polish ombudsman Janusz Kochanowski said the files he examined showed that Archbishop Wielgus collaborated with the Sluzba Bezpieczenstwa (SB) secret police in the 1970s.
Then on Friday the Church's own investigative committee said: "There exist numerous, important documents which show that Father Stanislaw Wielgus said he was ready to collaborate, in a conscious and secret manner, with the communist security services, and that he had begun that collaboration."
It went on to say that there was no clear proof that he "inflicted anyone any harm".
The revelations have triggered calls for his resignation.
The BBC's Adam Easton in Warsaw says Poland's communist authorities were particularly anxious to infiltrate the Catholic Church because they viewed it as a centre of resistance, but most priests refused to inform on their colleagues.
'Agent training'
Last month Pope Benedict XVI appointed Stanislaw Wielgus Archbishop of Warsaw, one of the most senior positions in the Polish Catholic Church.
The Church has a very prominent role in Polish society and was highly esteemed because of its leading role in the fight against communism in Poland and worldwide, particularly during the time of Polish Pope John Paul II.
Father Wielgus says he - like all priests - was obliged to meet SB agents.
But Polish media have alleged that he was more involved than most, and was given "special training for agents".
Historians estimate up to 15% of Polish clergy agreed to inform on their colleagues in the communist era.
When about 1 in 7 clergy were working for the old regime, it isn't really surprising that something like this should happen. There seems to be a general airing of dirty laundry going on in Poland, and, if that is so, there will be many more communist era clergy who will be exposed.
It also strikes me that this information might also be confirmed by communist era secret police operatives that might have worked with Fr. Wielgus. I think it would be in the best interest of everyone, if Fr. Wielgus aided the security apparatus in any fashion, that he step down.
This could get pretty messy.
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