One thousand and fifty years ago, probably on Holy Saturday of 966, Mieszko, Duke of Polan, in accordance with the ritual of baptism, renounced sin, made a profession of Christian faith, immersed himself in baptismal water, and finally received a white robe and a burning candle from the hands of the bishop. He was probably thinking about the supernatural dimension of his decision. He was trying to do what, as the Roman poet Tibullus put it, "pleases heaven. By asking for baptism, he acknowledged that the God of Christians is - as the prophet Isaiah proclaimed - "the only God, [...] the only Lord, and [...] there is no other besides Him". A fundamental historical change took place in the Polish lands, firmly rooted in the values then popularized on the European continent. Poland and its ruler were becoming part of Christian Europe.

 

Mieszko had to analyze the temporal consequences of his decision. He thought about personal consequences, such as the necessity to strive every day to live according to the moral requirements of the Decalogue and the Sermon on the Mount, so different from the requirements of the rules of the pagan world in which he had lived until then. He probably also thought about the consequences for the entire political community that he ruled. How many of those consequences did he foresee? Was he able to expect that the decision to accept baptism, reinforced 34 years later by the papal decision to establish a Polish ecclesiastical metropolis with its seat in Gniezno - i.e. his own, local, Polish Church, dependent only on the Holy See - would become one of the foundations of state unity?

Dear Congregants!

The adoption of baptism brought Poland into the circle of the Christian world, creating a modern basis for the cultural and religious identification of the inhabitants of the Piast state, and consequently also for the political and national identity of Poles. Baptism strengthened Poland's position in the international community and the internal cohesion of the state, introducing our country to the Western civilization.

The beginning of Christianization has been recognized for centuries as a symbolic caesura of Polish statehood. Thanks to his baptism, Prince Mieszko became equal in his position to  Other rulers of Christian countries at that time. Poland gained the protection of the Holy See and the country received an influx of clergy who played an extremely important role in every sphere of life. It is worth mentioning Bishop Jordan and Saint Adalbert, as well as the numerous monks who founded their monasteries on Polish soil.

The new religion brought with it a high legal and political culture. The formation of an effective church organization made it easier for Mieszko to manage the state. The clergy also created the basis for the chancellery and state diplomacy. They often represented the interests of the state in the international environment as the Duke's deputies. The priests, knowing the Latin language, carried on the prince's correspondence. Their chronicle entries are the main source of knowledge about the beginnings of the Polish statehood and of the thinking of the ruler and his subjects. Without such source materials, contemporary historical knowledge would be incomplete and imperfect.

The act of baptism radically changed the life of the Poles, not only providing them with different moral principles, but also giving them completely new, previously unknown possibilities of action. Although the baptismal ceremony was attended only by the duke and his closest ones (the court), the evangelization action included the other social groups and other tribes forming the feudal society of Piast Poland. Thanks to the emergence of a new law based on the Decalogue, moral principles and more egalitarian social relations were formed. Baptismal identity and faith became the glue effectively uniting the divided society, recently united by the Piast dynasty. Strict pagan customs disappeared. In their place appeared dialogue, understanding and tolerance, based on love of God and neighbor.

As St John Paul II wrote: 'For when speaking about Baptism we do not mean only the sacrament of Christian initiation received by the first historical ruler of Poland but also the event which was decisive for the origin of the nation and for the formation of its Christian identity. In this sense the date of the Baptism of Poland is a crucial date. Poland as a nation left its own historical prehistory and started to exist historically'.                                                        

 

Speaker of the Sejm Speaker of the Senate
Marek Kuchciński Stanisław Karczewski