Thirty-four years ago, on October 19, 1991, Father Jan Zieja died in Warsaw. He was a chaplain during the Polish-Bolshevik War and World War II, as well as a collaborator of the Council for Aid to Jews “Żegota” and co-founder of the Workers' Defense Committee. His life was a testimony that faithfulness to the Gospel means a readiness to serve every human being.
Chaplain and witness to wars
Jan Zieja was born in 1897 in Ossa, in the Kielce region. After his ordination and beginning his theological studies at the University of Warsaw, he volunteered for the army as a chaplain, serving soldiers during the Polish-Bolshevik War. In the interwar period, in addition to his pastoral work in various parts of Poland, he studied Jewish studies at the University of Warsaw for two years.
During the German occupation, he was chaplain to the Home Army Headquarters, the Grey Ranks, and the Peasant Battalions. It was Father Jan Zieja who, in November 1939, administered the oath to the organizers of the Secret Polish Army, founded by Witold Pilecki. As chaplain of the Institute for the Blind in Laski and the Congregation of Franciscan Sisters Servants of the Cross, Father Zieja became involved in underground activities.
Activities in Żegota
It was under conditions of secrecy that Zofia Kossak-Szczucka and Father Jan Zieja continued the pre-war activities of Catholic Action as part of the secret Front for the Rebirth of Poland. This led the priest to the Council for Aid to Jews, Żegota. The priest's task was to provide false baptism certificates, which allowed people to survive under a false Catholic identity.
Conscience and authority
After difficult wartime experiences, exacerbated by the defeat of the Warsaw Uprising, Fr. Zieja remained faithful to proclaiming the Gospel truth of Christian love for one's neighbor. This was particularly evident in Fr. Zieja's ministry in the early post-war years in Słupsk, where he called for an end to revenge against the local Germans. He preached that every German should be seen as a human being.
In communist Poland, he repeatedly spoke out for the persecuted, co-founded the Workers' Defense Committee, and preached a message of peace and responsibility. At the end of his life, Father Zieja became the “conscience of the era,” a priest who combined faith with action and taught the courage of love.
“I am a human being, I am a Pole, I am a Christian (...) My name is Man. I am not alone on earth (...) I love my nation, I love Poland,” wrote Father Jan Zieja in 1960 in Życie Religijne (Religious Life).
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