Carmelite Convent Auschwitz Unwarranted Polish Concessions Pajak

Strach Byc Polakiem, by Henryk Pajak. 1999

Especially Good on the Auschwitz Carmelite Convent Controversy and the Unwarranted Unilateral Polish Concessions

WHAT A HORROR TO BE A POLE is the title of this Polish-language work. This is a small book, but don’t let its size fool you. It is packed with information. For instance, one chapter is a compilation of many dozens of documented paragraph-size descriptions of derogatory Jewish remarks about Poles and Poland. This alone makes the book worthwhile.

Pajak (p. 69) notes that German reparations to Israel were to be reciprocated by softening the guilt of the Germans. Such things as the de-Germanization of the Nazis and the contrived dichotomy between Germans and Nazis are consistent with this trend. So is the pattern of Jewish attacks on Poland. Another chapter documents many instances of Poles who gave their lives attempting to save Jews during WWII. Still another expounds on world Jewry and its tardy and muted reaction to news about the unfolding Holocaust.

FRANK WALUS AND COMMUNISTS FROM POLAND

Pajak elaborates on the Frank Walus case. The Simon Wiesenthal Center pressed the case in court. The Polish-German Chicagoan was accused of being a Gestapo officer and of murdering Jews. In contrast to Jews who identified him as such, there were other eyewitnesses that testified to the fact that Walus had been a forced laborer in Germany during WWII. He was convicted, but this was overturned by an appellate court. Pajak believes that Walus had been set up by Marian Lipowski, an alleged Jewish PRL agent who had been sent to Chicago to try to divide Chicago’s Polish community. (p. 72).

AUSCHWITZ CARMELITE CONVENT AND CROSS CONTROVERSY: WHICH SIDE NEEDS TO APOLOGIZE?

To begin with, Jewish objections to prayers at the site neglected the fact that there were Poles and Christians murdered at the camp. In fact, the Germans established the camp in 1940 primarily for Poles. Not until 1942 were Jews murdered at the camp. (p. 81). Pajak condemns those Christian leaders, who agreed with the Jewish opponents of prayer at Auschwitz, for lacking logic and sound judgment. (pp. 82-83). Finally, the objections to prayer at Auschwitz were centered on the “empty sky” premise—that God had been silent at Auschwitz and that therefore we should all be silent towards Him. Pajak points out that God had also been silent at Golgotha, at the Warsaw Uprising, at Katyn, at Pawiak, at countless sites of Christian martyrdom, etc. Should prayer therefore be permanently banned at those sites? Finally, the sky was not empty over Auschwitz from everyone’s perspective. When Father (now Saint) Maksimilian Kolbe died his horrible death there, He did not find God absent. (p. 86).

It is hard to escape the conclusion that only Jewish opinions count, and no one else’s do.

APOLOGIES, APOLOGIES…AND MORE APOLOGIES

Poles are always told to “come to terms with the past” and to make endless apologies to Jews. In response, Pajak has compiled a detailed list of things for which Jews should apologize. (p. 159-on).

Will this ever happen?