Before our June happened to us, it took a few months, which suddenly started to flow in Poland at an accelerated pace. In order to understand the circumstances of the creation of the Krzyżowa Foundation, it is necessary to outline the atmosphere of those times.
After the sad years of the grey and coarse communist regime of the 1980s, important and extremely interesting things began to happen in Poland. Everybody frantically discussed the political changes and asked what would happen next. The economy in the country has been ruined. In the Soviet Union, Gorbachev introduces Perestroika, civil movements are beginning to form in the Baltic states, in Hungary, the right to free association (an unknown phenomenon in communism) is enacted, in the USA, the president is Ronald Reagan, who has set himself the goal of defeating communism. Germany was divided into two German states, and in the GDR the rebellion, the first protests and the first arrests began to grow. In Poland, after a dark night of martial law, strikes broke out every now and then and then and it was clear that something was hanging in the air. The authorities bent and agreed to meet the opposition at a round table, where the first free elections, freedom of the press and many other things that were not in the minds of anyone were established. A lot thing was going on at a fast pace. Newspapers became fascinating from day to day, which did not happen before. There was no end to the discussions of Poles until late at night.
Just before the Round Table (February 1989), a letter from Father Adam Żak to the Wrocław Club of Catholic Intelligentsia (CCI) arrived with a question about the property of Krzyżowa located in the Municipality of Grodziszcze, Świdnica district. At the beginning, a hard search began for someone who could know something about the place (there was no such place on many maps) and the people who used to live there. At first Michał1 searched at home, asking his father and others in the CCI. Then he went with Wieczorynka2 to East Berlin to Ludwig3, who, because of his opposition involvement in the GDR, knew almost everyone, and his name opened many doors. Ludwig contacted them with the German originators of "doing something" in Krzyżowa, i.e. Prof. Ullman, Stephan Steinlein and Wolfgang Buerger. After their return to Wrocław, things started to go at an accelerated pace.
First Stephan and Wolfgang came to the CCI and told some stories about the Kreisau Circle, then the letters moved in different directions and telephones rang (a small explanation: due to the censorship of correspondence, foreign letters were best sent by friends who were leaving for the West and there could throw letters in the mailbox, and for the ordered telephone call you had to wait for hours or days). Consultations started with Prof. Karol Jońca and Fr. Bolesław Kałuża4. During the consultations a motion was born - we are holding an international conference. It was necessary to prepare logistics: obtain permission from the Ministry of the Interior. Each international conference had to be approved in such a way that if it was granted, it reached the organizers a few days before the planned date, therefore the April deadline was notified to the Ministry of the Interior, but in the invitations we informed about the date of 2-4 June 1989. It was necessary to gather the contacts to potentially interested, send out invitations - again, preferably by friends travelling to the West, organize accommodation (mainly in the homes of club members, relatives and friends) and food for the participants (it was a difficult task in Poland, where there was only vinegar on the shelves in shops!). The contact point was the Czapliński family's house, located favorably on the road from the highway to the city centre of Wrocław. All this required a great deal of commitment. It was difficult for us to keep up with the parallel events in the country, where the first free elections to the Senate and almost free elections to the Sejm, in which the organization involved many members of the CCI, were taking place. At the same time, in Germany, our friends associated with the Bensberger Kreis5 started meetings and correspondence with various authorities.
And so came the day in June, when the guests started to come together. First to the contact point, where they were greeted by other participants of the conference, because we were busy at the place of the conference, i.e. the headquarters of CCI at Marks Square 22 in Wrocław (after 1989 renamed Strzelecki Square), where Dr. Ewa Unger6 was in charge, or we were helping in the transport around the city. During one of the city tours, I noticed a funny yellow car - a bus. Behind the wheel was a grey-haired leprechaun, and next to him an equally grey-haired wife. As they seemed to be lost by turning the map in all directions, I asked them to come to the conference. It turned out that it was Wim and Lin7, completely charming Dutchmen. Besides them, there were also Americans and Germans from both parts of Germany and West Berlin. In many cases they were people who knew each other from stories or publications, but it wasn't until they arrived in Poland that they were able to meet directly (Germans from East Germany couldn't contact the West freely). It was one of the many amazing moments of the conference.
The main theme of the conference was the Kreisau Circle, but the title was "Christian in Society", referring to Anna Morawska's book about pastor Bohnhoffer, "Christian in the Third Reich". A seemingly loose relationship, although Bohnhoffer was ideologically connected with the Circle. But for us, who grew up in communism, the attitude of decency in extreme conditions, defined by Prof. Bartoszewski, was important. Communism was sometimes not as extreme as Nazism (although it was also cruel), but all the more so it created the temptation of conformism8. We were impressed by the far-sightedness, faithfulness to the values and full trust in God and His judgments, which characterized the members of the Kreisau Circle.
The whole history of the Circle seemed to us to be quite amazing, we felt a bit like in a Hollywood film, because the whole story is worth it.
Well, there's a great story in the background. The system was collapsing and the spring of Europe was beginning. Everything rushed even faster. Also for Krzyżowa.
Maryna Czaplińska – Member of the Council of the Krzyżowa Foundation for Mutual Understanding in Europe
Michał Czapliński – Member of the Honorary Council of the Krzyżowa Foundation for Mutual Understanding in Europe
[1] Michał Czapliński
[2] Joanna Wieczorek- Doebler
[3] Ludwig Mehlhorn
[4] And here is a small story about Fr. Kaluza and Freya von Moltke. Freya, starting the Krzyżowa issue in 1988 at a conference in the USA, or later, when the issue of the participation of the representative of the von Moltke Family in the Mass with the participation of the Prime Minister of Mazovia and Chancellor Kohl, did not say a word that she is quite regular in Krzyżowa and has warm contacts with Father Kałuża. She waited patiently until the Poles themselves invited her to Krzyżowa.
[5] These included Auwi and Maria Heckt as well as Irngard and Bernd Ammermann.
[6] Dr. Ewa Unger - President of the Club of Catholic Intelligentsia in Wrocław
[7] Wim and Lin Leenmann
[8] As Jerzy Kisielewski used to say: "The fact that we are in deep shit is clear. The problem is that we're starting to organise ourselves in it."
