The drive of the Moscow Patriarchate to spread its jurisdiction over Orthodox believers in postwar Poland faced serious problems. Although the Russian Orthodox Church had never given up its historical and canonical arguments in favor of such rights, it had to proceed very carefully for political reasons. Poland was one of the major victims of the war, and the Soviet Union participated in its 1939 partition as Hitler’s ally. Despite the Soviet propaganda attempts to blame the Nazis for the Katyn massacre, its discovery had a negative effect on the Kremlin’s international prestige. Therefore, Stalin’s government was not able to use the full potential of the Soviet military presence on Polish territory, as it had in other places. At the same time, the future of the Orthodox believers who remained in Western Belarus, Galicia, Volhynia, and Polesye after their incorporation into Russian church territory was predestined by the Soviet victory in the war. Therefore, after September 1939, Moscow linked the issue of a future Polish autocephaly only with the Orthodox structures that remained within the new borders of Poland.
Although Stalin and Patriarch Alexii shared common interests in this case, they pursued different aims. The former looked for a Soviet stronghold in postwar Poland, whereas the latter wanted to heal one of the painful consequences of the post-1917 dissolution of the Russian Orthodox Church by restoring its jurisdiction there. In this respect, Alexii emphasized his status as successor to the late patriarchs Tikhon and Sergii, who had never given up their rights over the eparchies included in the interwar territory of the Polish state. Moreover, none of the locum tenentes of the Moscow Patriarchate (Agathangel, Peter, and Sergii) had ever betrayed this position. On May 1, 1940, Metropolitan Sergii imposed suspension on the supporters of Polish autocephaly.106 In March 1942, he made clear his position on this question. In Sergii’s view, the 1939 reunion of the western parts of Belarus and Ukraine with the Soviet Union brought an end to the independence of the Orthodox Church in Poland. In a letter to the former Polish ambassador in Kuibyshev, the locum tenens explained that the autocephaly of the Orthodox Church in postwar Poland was a question for future discussions.107
The same position was taken by the Soviet authorities. In a report that the CAROC’s representative in Minsk, N. Chesnokov, sent to G. Karpov in Moscow in March 1946, the head of the Polish Orthodox Church, Metropolitan Dionisii (Valedinskii), had himself denounced Polish autocephaly in 1939, when his rights as church administrator were transferred to the Orthodox Metropolitan of Berlin, Seraphim (Lade). According to the same source, the same Polish hierarch left written evidence that his church had lost its autocephalous status after the wartime partition of Poland. On November 25, 1939, Dionisii requested to be allowed to return to Warsaw “in order to take back the administration and government of that part of the former autocephalous Orthodox Church in Poland that is situated in the territory included in the sphere of German state interests.”108 When the war was over, however, the representatives of the Orthodox Church in Poland emphasized that this act had been done under pressure, that is, at the time
Metropolitan Dionisii was thrown in a Nazi jail. They also pointed to the protests of the Patriarchate of Constantinople against the removal of the head of the autoCephalous Polish Orthodox Church in the autumn 1940 and the subsequent restoration of Dionisii on that position.109
to the victorious march of the Red Army to Berlin, the Moscow Patriarchate restored its control over the Orthodox dioceses in the western borderlands belonging to Poland before 1939 and was presented with an opportunity to spread it over Poland proper as well. Initially, the Polish question was approached by Karpov in the same way as the Czechoslovakian one, but in this case the Sub-Carpathian role was to be played by the Bialystok diocese, annexed by the Soviet Union in September 1939. On December 14, 1944, a conference convoked by local Orthodox believers rejected the claims of the Polish Bishop Timothy (Shreter) to act as their hierarch and declared reunion with Moscow. On December 22, the Bialystok diocese was visited by the Archbishop of Minsk, Vasilii (Ratmirov), who had been in charge of the Orthodox population in Soviet Belarus since September 1944.110 On the same day, the Bialystok clergy signed a “free-will act of reunion with the Moscow Patriarchate.” It was confirmed by a special order issued by Patriarch Alexii on February 12, 1945.111
The plan, however, did not work as expected. The Bialystok voevodstvo (district civil authorities), with the support of the Polish Ministry of Administration, refused to legalize the change in church government. Under these circumstances, Moscow looked for a compromise. In the sprinG of 1945, the Soviet embassy to Poland began preparations for future negotiations between the local Orthodox Church and the Moscow Patriarchate.112 In the beginning of May 1945, Bishop Timothy was invited to visit the embassy in Warsaw. During the talks he informed the Soviet diplomats that he was the actual head of the Polish Orthodox Church, since Metropolitan Dionisii fled in July 1944, and expressed his wish to establish contact with Patriarch Alexii in order to negotiate the reunion of his church with the Moscow Patriarchate. He stated that his request was supported by all three Polish Orthodox dioceses. Finally, he declared his readiness to accept a decision fTom Moscow about the future head of the Polish Orthodox Church and to be obedient to their choice. This proposal was welcomed by Soviet authorities, and Patriarch Alexii agreed to meet with Timothy in Moscow on May 20, 1945.113
This second scenario for the subjection of the Orthodox Church in Poland to Moscow failed as well. The capitulation of Nazi Germany made the return of Metropolitan Dionisii to Poland possible, and Timothy lost his rights as temporary administrator of the Orthodox Church there. Meanwhile, Dionisii had no intention of accepting Moscow’s jurisdiction. On May 20, 1945, he asked Patriarch Alexii to establish communion with the Russian Orthodox Church. His request, however, did not touch the issue of autocephaly. The subsequent attempts of Patriarch Alexii to refute the independent status that the Orthodox Poles had received from the Patriarch of Constantinople in 1924 by arguing that only the Russian mother church had the canonical right to grant such independence faced the stubborn resistance of DionisiI.114
In February 1946, the Polish hierarch sent another letter to Alexii, in which he continued to defend the autocephalous status of the Polish Orthodox Church. In Dionisii’s view, this quality played an important role in the balance of the political and religious interests in interwar Poland and in the survival of Orthodoxy there. He insisted that autocephaly had a positive impact on the political leaders in his country, thus contributing to the preservation of 1,500 Orthodox parishes, 2,000 temples, and the great Pochaev and another 15 smaller monasteries with their buildings and land.115 Dionisii also pointed out that this church independence was the argument that had persuaded the Polish government to set up an Orthodox theological faculty at the University of Warsaw.
He also believed that autocephaly played an important role in overcoming the isolation of the Polish Orthodox Church from the rest of the Christian world. As a result, during the interwar period Polish Orthodox clerics were able to attend forums of international Christian movements, where they also defended the interests of the Russian Orthodox Church in a moment when it had not been able to defend itself. Moreover, the Polish church head claimed that he had laid the groundwork for the abolition of the schism declared over the Bulgarian Exarchate by the Church of Constantinople in 1872. Although Dionisii recognized Moscow’s assistance in this act, accomplished by the Ecumenical Patriarchate on February 22, 1945, he pointed to the previous steps made in this direction and particularly to the consent that Patriarch Basil of Constantinople had given to him to perform liturgy in Sofia together with Metropolitan Stefan of Sofia on May 16, 1927. Dionisii also emphasized that the ancient Orthodox patriarchates and the churches of Greece, Serbia, and Romania recognized Polish autocephaly in the same year. In addition, he noted that even the Germans who arrested him after the occupation of Poland had no choice but to release him after the official protest of the Patriarch of Constantinople announced via the radio programs in Paris and London in the autumn of 1940. In the end of his letter, Metropolitan Dionisii drew the attention oF the Moscow Patriarch to the fact that the suffering and victimization of his church during the Nazi occupation added new holiness to its independent status.116
This stubborn defense of Polish autocephaly irritated the state and church authorities in Moscow. They also worried about the behavior of Bishop Timothy (Shretter). On June 17, 1945, he was appointed by the Polish Ministry of Administration to supervise the Orthodox Church in the territory of the Bialystok voevodstvO.117 Having such protection, he launched an openly anti-Russian campaign, which coincided with the attacks of Polish clandestine units against the Orthodox Belarusian population. Therefore, Moscow had to search for an alternative way to fulfill its plans. According to the CAROC vice-chairman, S. K. Belyshev, the Kremlin had to “advise” its Polish comrades to arrest Dionisii as a German agent and to deprive him of the right to govern the Orthodox Church in Poland. According to Belyshev, it was necessary to postpone the final resolution of the Polish question until the parliamentary elections in Poland scheduled for the autumn of 1946. Meanwhile, all attempts of Metropolitan Dionisii to visit Patriarch Alexii had to be diverted. The major argument for this attitude was the Refusal of the Polish hierarch to treat his church as dependent on the Moscow Patriarchate, as, for example, in his persistence in referring to both as “sister churches.”118
After analyzing the situation in Poland and its Orthodox Church, the CAROC decided to postpone the reunion, but to use this time for its preparation. It was thought that the time was not politically appropriate to organize a show trial against Dionisii. At the same time, the CAROC did not make its final decision about who would become the future head of the Polish Orthodox Church. It also Had serious doubts about Dionisii and Timothy and even foresaw their “transfer to internal dioceses in the USSR, while replacing them with [Soviet] bishops, appointed by the Moscow Patriarchate.”119 Meanwhile, the CAROC allowed the letters of Metropolitan Dionisii to reach Patriarch Alexii. In the course of this correspondence, Dionisii had to “be compelled to define his attitude to the Moscow Patriarchate and to put forward the question of the liquidation of the Polish autocephaly and its joining to the Moscow Patriarchate.”120 In addition, Metropolitan Dionisii was removed from the administrative affairs of his church, but formally his rank of Metropolitan of Warsaw anD All Poland was preserved until the ultimate solution of the problem.121
On November 13, 1946, a Polish delegation led by the Minister of Justice, G. Swentkowski, was received by Karpov in the CAROC’s office.122 THe Soviet host asked his guests many questions: Which ministry and which concrete person were responsible for religious issues in Poland? What was the opinion of the Polish government concerning a liquidation of the autocephaly of the local Orthodox Church? Did the Polish Orthodox Church maintain canonical relations with other Slav Orthodox churches? What was the situation of the Polish Orthodox Church and its episcopate? Swentkowski answered that the Ministry of Interior had a special Religious Cults Department. The ministry, however, was controlled by Stanislaw Mikolajczik, considered by the Polish communists as one of their worst enemies. In Swentkowski’s view, this was the main reason for the unpleasant developments in the religious sphere. At the same time, the head of the Religious Cult Department was a young man who coordinated his activities with Swentkowski himself. They also worked together on the texts of the future constitution of Poland, foreseeing the separation of church from state at the beginning of 1947.
The Polish delegates brought to the attention of their Moscow host the relative growth of the Catholic Church, whose believers comprised 95 percent of the Polish population after the change of the borders and the deportation of German Protestants. At the same time, Orthodox believers numbered only 150,000. In this regard, Swentkowski mentioned that Warsaw would agree with the appointment of a new head of the Polish Orthodox Church by Patriarch Alexii. He could be a person close to the Patriarch, but should not come to Warsaw as a Russian bishop, as was done in Czechoslovakia. The Polish delegates insisted that the Moscow appointee had to accept Polish citizenship from the very beginning. Concerning the destiny of Metropolitan Dionisii, they stated that he must be tried for his collaboration with the Nazis. Discussing the other Polish bishop, Timothy,
Swentkowski emphasized that he was better than Dionisii because there were “no materials concerning his inimical activity against the Soviet state or about his collaboration with the occupiers.” After the removal of Dionisii fTom the actual government of the Polish Orthodox Church, his duties were to be transferred to Timothy. At the same time, on behalf of his state, Swentkowski declared its categorical refusal to accept the liquidation of autocephaly and subordination of the Orthodox Poles to Moscow. He stated, “Even if [the Moscow locum tenens] Sergii has been right not to recognize the [Polish] autocephaly, now Patriarch Alexii is obliged to abolish this ban and permit the autocephaly.”123
During his talks with Karpov, Swentkowski suggested that Patriarch Alexii’s initiatives toward the Polish Orthodox Church were probably not discussed in advance with the Kremlin because the Soviet government had always emphasized the right of Poland to independence and self-government. He stressed that the pressure exerted by the Moscow Patriarchate over the Polish Orthodox Church was in contradiction with such a statement. According to Swentkowski, even if there were only 5,000 Orthodox believers remaining in Poland, Warsaw would insist on its autocephaly. The Polish delegates warneD that the attitude of Patriarch Alexii to the Polish Orthodox Church had a negative impact because it kept the Polish Church isolated fTom communion with other Slav churches.124 In this way, the Moscow Patriarchate had to postpone the ultimate solution for the next round, after securing the control of the Communist Party in Poland and the inclusion of the country in the Soviet orbit. At the same time, Moscow had to give up its plan for a reunion of the Polish Orthodox Church and concentrated its efforts on the rejection of the act of autocephaly granted by the Patriarchate of Constantinople in 1924. Instead, it pursued a replacement of the 1924 autoceph-aly with a new one, granted by the Patriarchate of Moscow as the canonical mother church of the Orthodox believers in Poland.
On April 17, 1947, G. Karpov reported to the Council of Ministers on the necessity of arranging Polish-Russian Church relations more quickly. He emphasizeD that Poland remained the only Slav state whose Orthodox Church lacked “regulated and friendly relations with the Moscow Patriarchate.”125 He also informed the Soviet leadership of the measures undertaken by the government in Warsaw to solve the problem. They included a petition from “the Orthodox people in Poland” to the government for the removal of Metropolitan Dionisii; the intimidation of Dionisii by a threat made by a state representative to try him for collaboration with the Nazis and his anti-canonical appointment by Constantinople, paired with a proposal for his voluntary withdrawal from the office and retirement to a monastery; and the establishment of a temporary church leadership that would send a delegation to the Moscow Patriarchate to negotiate the destiny of the Polish Orthodox Church and the appointment of its new head. At the same time, the Polish government insisted that the independence of its state required an autocephalous status for the local Orthodox Church.
In his turn, Patriarch Alexii agreed with this plan and proposed a series of ecclesiastical steps. According to them, the Moscow Patriarchate should abolish the ban over the Polish Orthodox Church imposed by the locum tenens
Sergii in 1940, recognize the autocephalous status of the Polish Church, and receive the church delegation for resolving the problem. The Kremlin gave a green light to this plan.126 Soon Metropolitan Dionisii was removed fTom his office, and his place was taken by a temporary church government that entered in contact with the Russian mother church. It turned to Patriarch Alexii with a request that he abolish the ban on Orthodox Poles imposed by Patriarch Tikhon on May 23, 1924, because of their voluntary acceptance of autocephaly fTom the Church of Constantinople without asking the permission of the mother church; the petition also asked that Alexii grant them autocephaly. Then a Polish church delegation visited Moscow, where it repented the sins of the previous church leaders and recognized as noncanonical the 1924 autocephaly received from Constantinople. On these grounds, on June 22, 1948, the Moscow Patriarchate restored canonical communion of prayer and liturGy with the Orthodox Poles and granted them autocephaly. It also allowed the Polish Orthodox Church to elect its new head.127
World History
