Jerzy Urban Russian agent?
www.stevepound.org.uk/2004-bookreview.htmlTo Kill A Priest
Book Review (2004)
It is hard to believe that a better book could be written about the brutal murder of Fr. Jerzy Popiełuszko, and the way in which the national sense of horror hastened the end of the Communist regime in Poland, than that which Kevin Ruane has produced.
The author was not only there at the time but actually witnessed the process of denial, denigration and finally destruction that was the reaction of the then state government to the young priest from Okopy, near Białystock, who is the subject of this excellent book.
Ruane was a BBC journalist in Poland during the desperate years between the imposition of martial law and the murder of Fr. Popiełuszko and he has contacts at every level of Polish life.
His access to Fr. Popiełuszko�s diaries makes this the definitive book on the subject and the best piece of work since my old Solidarity with Solidarity colleague Wiktor Moszczynski wrote a major article in the East European Reporter in January 1985.
Ruane writes beautifully and with a profound knowledge of Polish politics and geography. He clearly understands the tensions that existed with the Polish Roman Catholic Church and is immensely sympathetic to Archbishop (later Cardinal) Glemp who was the subject of some criticism twenty two years ago for a perception that he sought an accommodation between Catholic Church and atheistic State.
If I have a criticism of Ruane it is that he seems sometimes almost too sympathetic to many of the men of 1984.
In the case of Prime Minister and Defence Minister General Jaruzelski and General Kiszczak it can be appreciated that they were torn between a pragmatic recognition of the growing strength of the Church and the Solidarity movement in the early 1980s and the pressure from Moscow and shadowy organisations such as the Anti-Solidarity Organisation (OAS).
Ruane rightly chooses not to rush to total condemnation and history will probably support his viewpoint but it is almost impossible for anyone, even as peripherally involved as I was, to understand his sympathy fro the then official Government spokesman, Jerzy Urban.
Urban is now the millionaire publisher of a pornographic anticlerical magazine called �Nie� (Polish for No) and continues his diatribes against the Church as if he was still being paid by Premier Andropov.
In the months leading up to the murder of Fr. Popiełuszko articles by Jerzy Urban appeared in publications such as Tu I Teraz (Here and Now) under pen names such as Jan Rem and � in the opinion of many contemporary readers � contributed to the hysteria of the attacks on the young Priest.
Ruane�s opinion must be respected but he does seem to be almost too forgiving of this sinister and conspiratorial figure.
It is a measure of the quality of Ruane�s work that this is one of the few areas in which one can cavil.
The story he tells is one of breathless intensity but never less than scrupulously accurate and makes use of the widest range of sources.
From the city stopping funeral of the eighteen year old schoolboy, Grzegorz Przemyk in May 1983 to the murder of Fr. Popiełuszko in the autumn of the following year Ruane describes a nation in turmoil and an ever more desperate government facing a population growing in confidence and knowledge of their strength.
Fr. Popiełuszko had become an increasingly influential critic of the Communist regime since the imposition of martial law in December 1981 but it was his presence at the funeral of the schoolboy that gave him a national, and international, prominence.
His regular Masses for the Homeland began to attract vast crowds and he became the �Solidarity Priest� in the eyes of the state apparatus and the predominantly Catholic people of Poland.
Just as Ireland became effectively ungovernable in the first decade of the 20th. Century so Polish demands for free trades unions and freedom of religious worship challenged the state in a battle that only one could win.
The attacks on Fr. Popiełuszko began with smears and proceeded to random arrests, harassment and the planting of forbidden materials in his room.
None of these diminished the hold that the priest had on the people and middle ranking officers of the security forces looked to a more drastic solution.
Why a thirty-six year old priest who suffered chronic illness throughout his life should become a target for the state can only be understood in the context of Poland under martial law and in the light of the extraordinary passion with which Fr. Popiełuszko spoke to the Polish nation.
He was finally murdered on a lonely road north of Warsaw by three Special Branch officers who beat him with a sand filled sock and wood wrapped in rags. A sack of rocks was tied to his leg and he was thrown off a bridge into the Vistula near Torun.
The crudity and brutality of the murder typified the inchoate fury of the state and its inability to reduce the power of the voice of Popiełuszko.
In the short term they succeeded. In the long they failed.
Fr. Popiełuszko is remembered today as one who hastened the end of Communism and paid with his life.
Kevin Ruane�s enthralling book is a fitting testament and essential reading for any student of the period or for anyone with an interest in the fall of Communism and the strength of the individual.
