The Archdiocese of Gdańsk () is a

Latin Church The Latin Church () is the largest autonomous () particular church within the Catholic Church, whose members constitute the vast majority of the 1.3 billion Catholics. The Latin Church is one of 24 Catholic particular churches and liturgical ...

ecclesiastical jurisdiction or

archdiocese In church governance, a diocese or bishopric is the ecclesiastical district under the jurisdiction of a bishop. History In the later organization of the Roman Empire, the increasingly subdivided provinces were administratively associated ...

of the

Catholic Church The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

. The diocese's

episcopal see An episcopal see is the area of a bishop's ecclesiastical jurisdiction. Phrases concerning actions occurring within or outside an episcopal see are indicative of the geographical significance of the term, making it synonymous with ''diocese'' ...

Gdańsk Gdańsk is a city on the Baltic Sea, Baltic coast of northern Poland, and the capital of the Pomeranian Voivodeship. With a population of 486,492, Data for territorial unit 2261000. it is Poland's sixth-largest city and principal seaport. Gdań ...

. According to the church statistics Sunday mass attendance was 38.1% in 2013 making it lower than the Polish average of weekly mass attendance (39.1%). Its Archcathedral Basilica of The Holy Trinity, Blessed Virgin Mary and St Bernard in Gdańsk is listed as a Historic Monument of Poland.

History

After

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

and restoration of independent Poland, the city of Gdańsk (Danzig) was not restored to Poland from Germany, but rather turned into a free city according to the

Treaty of Versailles The Treaty of Versailles was a peace treaty signed on 28 June 1919. As the most important treaty of World War I, it ended the state of war between Germany and most of the Allies of World War I, Allied Powers. It was signed in the Palace ...

. The Catholic congregation west of the

Vistula The Vistula (; ) is the longest river in Poland and the ninth-longest in Europe, at in length. Its drainage basin, extending into three other countries apart from Poland, covers , of which is in Poland. The Vistula rises at Barania Góra i ...

belonged to the Diocese of Chełmno, which was restored to

and east of the Vistula to the Diocese of Warmia, which remained part of Weimar Germany in the

interbellum In the history of the 20th century, the interwar period, also known as the interbellum (), lasted from 11 November 1918 to 1 September 1939 (20 years, 9 months, 21 days) – from the end of World War I (WWI) to the beginning of World War II ( ...

. Germans within the administration of the Diocese of Chełmno were replaced by Polish priests and the Polish language was implemented as binding. While about 130,000 people in Danzig were Catholic, only about 10 percent of them were Polish-speaking and the first attempts to reorganize the ecclesiastical allocation were made in spring 1919, when members of the German congregation asked for an affiliation to the Diocese of Warmia. While these attempts were supported by the German government, the Polish government tried to preserve the current situation. Pope

Pius XI Pope Pius XI (; born Ambrogio Damiano Achille Ratti, ; 31 May 1857 – 10 February 1939) was head of the Catholic Church from 6 February 1922 until his death in February 1939. He was also the first sovereign of the Vatican City State u ...

decided to establish an ''Apostolic Administrator of the Free City of Danzig'' on 24 April 1922, which was directly subordinated to the Pope. In 1925 a concordat between Poland and the Holy See was signed and the Apostolic Administrator was now supposed to be subordinated to the

Nuncio An apostolic nuncio (; also known as a papal nuncio or simply as a nuncio) is an ecclesiastical diplomat, serving as an envoy or a permanent diplomatic representative of the Holy See to a state or to an international organization. A nuncio is ...

of Warsaw, which caused protests among the local populace. Thus the Pope established the exempt Diocese of Danzig on 30 December 1925 and appointed Edward O'Rourke as the first Bishop on 2 January 1926. The Diocese was promoted as Metropolitan Archdiocese of Gdańsk on 25 March 1992. On 17 November 1993, the Archbishop issued the instructions on the status of Kashubian as a language of liturgy.

Reports of sex abuse

In 2019, three protestors toppled a statue of Rev. Henryk Jankowski following revelations that he sexually abused Barbara Borowiecka when she was a girl. Jankowski, who also had a criminal investigation involving the sexual abuse of a boy dropped against him in 2004, had been defrocked in 2005. However, he died in 2010 without ever being convicted of sex abuse. It has also been acknowledged that Lech Walsea's personal chaplain Rev. Franciszek Cybula had been accused of committing acts of sex abuse while serving in the as well. On 13 August 2020, Pope Francis removed Gdańsk Archbishop

Sławoj Leszek Głódź Sławoj Leszek Głódź (born 13 August 1945) is a Polish prelate of the Catholic Church who served as Archbishop of Gdańsk from 2008 to 2020. He has been a bishop since 1991 and before that spent a decade working in the Roman Curia. Early l ...

, who was among those who covered up abuse committed by Jankowski and Cybula.https://www.wral.com/pope-cleans-house-in-poland-after-abuse-cover-up-scandal/19233772/ Glodz had also presided over Cybula's funeral. Despite the fact that Glodz had just turned 75, the required age for Catholic Bishops to offer their resignation, the move was described as "cleaning house," as it is highly unusual for the Pope to accept such a resignation on a prelate's actual birthday.

Special churches

* Cathedral, Minor Basilica: ** Cathedral Basilica of The Holy Trinity * Co-Cathedral, Minor Basilica: ** Co-Cathedral Basilica of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary * Minor Basilicas: ** St. Nicholas' Basilica, Gdańsk **St. Brigid Basilica, Gdańsk

Leadership

;Diocesan bishops * 1926–1938 - Edward O'Rourke (2 June 1926 – 13 June 1938) **

Apostolic Administrator An apostolic administration in the Catholic Church is administrated by a prelate appointed by the pope to serve as the ordinary for a specific area. Either the area is not yet a diocese (a stable 'pre-diocesan', usually missionary apostolic admi ...

of the

Free City of Danzig The Free City of Danzig (; ) was a city-state under the protection and oversight of the League of Nations between 1920 and 1939, consisting of the Baltic Sea port of Danzig (now Gdańsk, Poland) and nearly 200 other small localities in the surrou ...

, 1922–1926 * Carl Maria Splett (Karol Maria Splett) (13 June 1938 – 5 March 1964) ** arrested by the Polish communist government in 1945 and imprisoned; emigrated to Germany in 1956 * 1945–1951 - Andrzej Wronka, apostolic administrator * 1951–1956 - Jan Cymanowski,

vicar A vicar (; Latin: '' vicarius'') is a representative, deputy or substitute; anyone acting "in the person of" or agent for a superior (compare "vicarious" in the sense of "at second hand"). Linguistically, ''vicar'' is cognate with the English p ...

* Edmund Nowicki (7 March 1964– 10 March 1971) **

coadjutor bishop A coadjutor bishop (or bishop coadjutor) ("co-assister" in Latin) is a bishop in the Latin Catholic, Anglican and (historically) Eastern Orthodox churches whose main role is to assist the diocesan bishop in administering the diocese. The coa ...

, 1951–1964 * Lech Kaczmarek (1 December 1971– 31 July 1984) * Tadeusz Gocłowski (31 December 1984 – 25 March 1992) ;Metropolitan bishops * Tadeusz Gocłowski (25 March 1992 – 17 April 2008) *

(17 April 2008 – 13 August 2020) * Tadeusz Wojda (2 March 2021 – present) ;Auxiliary bishops * 1958–1971 – Lech Kaczmarek * 1972–1982 – Kazimierz Kluz * 1983–1984 – Tadeusz Gocłowski * 1985–2005 – Zygmunt Pawłowicz (retired in 2005) * 2005–2012 – Ryszard Kasyna * since 2014 – Wiesław Szlachetka * 2015–2022 – Zbigniew Zieliński * since 2022 – Piotr Przyborek

Suffragan dioceses

Pelplin Pelplin () is a town in northern Poland, in the Tczew County, Pomeranian Voivodship. Population: 8,320 (2009). Pelplin is located in the ethnocultural region of Kociewie in Pomerania. It is home to one of the finest collections of medieval art ...

Toruń Toruń is a city on the Vistula River in north-central Poland and a World Heritage Sites of Poland, UNESCO World Heritage Site. Its population was 196,935 as of December 2021. Previously, it was the capital of the Toruń Voivodeship (1975–199 ...

References

External links

GCatholic.org

Diocese website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gdansk Roman Catholic dioceses in Poland Christian organizations established in 1925

Archdiocese In church governance, a diocese or bishopric is the ecclesiastical district under the jurisdiction of a bishop. History In the later organization of the Roman Empire, the increasingly subdivided provinces were administratively associated ...

Roman Catholic dioceses and prelatures established in the 20th century