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Freedom Collection

Interviews with Zbigniew and Zofia Romaszewski

Interviewed October 3, 2024

MR. ROMASZEWSKI: The role of [Pope] John Paul II [first Polish pope who led the Catholic Church 1978-2005] in those transformations was, in my opinion, absolutely essential. What I mean is, all the activities that we undertook in the social self-defense committee – KOR [The Workers’ Defense Committee, an anticommunist underground civil society organization in the 1970s, formed to provide assistance to laborers and others persecuted by the government], and which were large-scale. We published books, periodicals, newspapers brochures. So the entire scope of our activity, I believe that the overall number of people involved in this was maybe 2,000. The question here would be where to draw the line of sufficient activity for someone to be counted among the members of this movement. So this was crucial, because these people were the activists who would later be able to budge the nascent Solidarity [a labor union formed by Gdansk ship builders that transformed into a nationwide resistance movement]. But to think that we might have to do this without John Paul II, well ok, then we would have taken maybe 50 years doing it. Just to reach everyone, you know.

And what we have is the year 1979 [when John Paul II visits Poland] breaks out and brings this impulse; the people get out into the street and see that the numbers of police, of secret service, all those are such that you could swarm over them in one go. That millions are participating in these High Masses, [millions] of people who think the same way. So thus the people digested this experience, then a year went by, and then Solidarity was born.

Our – you know, the entire society was preparing to receive John Paul II. Our daughter was preparing some mattresses, so she was going to be sleeping out in the street just to keep her preferred spot. And throughout society people functioned this way. You know, being there, the paramount importance of being there, of participating.