VATICAN: The Vatican has issued a stern warning to Radio Maryja, Poland's Catholic fundamentalist radio station, to stay out of domestic politics. Msgr Jozef Kowalczyk, the papal nuncio in Poland, wrote a letter yesterday to the head of the Redemptorist order that owns Radio Maryja, expressing the Vatican's "deep concern about Radio Maryja's political commitments".
In a separate letter, he urged Polish bishops to "gather together to try to overcome the current difficulties brought about by some of the broadcasts and positions taken by Radio Maryja".
It is the second Vatican rebuke in three months for the radio station, with 1.2 million listeners, that mixes incantations of the Rosary with rants against homosexuals, liberals and Jews.
Last month, a presenter attacked on-air the "Kikes" who "humiliate" Poland with their compensation demands over property lost in the second World War. Yesterday, the last surviving leader of the 1943 uprising in Warsaw's Jewish Ghetto attacked the "xenophobia, chauvinism and anti-Semitism" of Radio Maryja.
"Some of these broadcasts are no different from those in the Nazi newspaper Der Stürmer, said Marek Edelman (83), calling on the government to eliminate the station's poisonous ideology or even close it down. That puts the ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party in a difficult position: Radio Maryja is one of its most fervent supporters and has helped the party win over voters from ultra-Catholic political parties.
Poland's Open Republic (OR) organisation, a group that campaigns against anti-Semitism, is planning to take the station to court. "If a radio station violates the law, it should be punished and Radio Maryja has violated many, many laws," said Paula Sawicka, president of the OR.