Poland’s New President Opposed by Pro-Life Leaders

Pro-life leaders in Poland are dismayed over the outcome of the country’s presidential election on Sunday. The Polish people elected liberal Bronislaw Komorowski to fill the spot left open after the late president Lech Kaczynski perished April 10th in a mysterious plane crash on Russian soil.

Komorowski, 58, defeated Jaroslaw Kaczynski, 61, the late president’s identical twin, garnering 53% of the vote to Kaczynski’s 47%.  Pro-life candidate Marek Jurek got only 1% of the vote and did not proceed to the second round.

Komorowski’s win gives the Civic Platform party full control of the government with party ally Donald Tusk already serving as Prime Minister.  Conservative commentators have warned that this situation could endanger the nation’s sovereignty, as the party is more favorable to foreign influence and cooperation with the European Union.

The election was called after President Kaczynski, his wife, Polish military leaders, and numerous high-level government officials were killed in a plane crash when trying to land in Smolensk, Russia en route to a commemoration of the 70th anniversary of the Katyn massacre.  The cause of the crash, which killed everyone on board, is still under investigation by Russian authorities, under the jurisdiction of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.

Following the crash, Komorowski, who served as parliamentary speaker, was elevated to acting president.  In that position, he signed a law purporting to combat family violence that gives the state sweeping powers to intervene in family life.  Among other things, the bill outlaws “imposing one’s own opinions on the child,” “restricting the child’s social contacts,” and “criticizing the child’s sexual behavior.”

He also supports state-funded in vitro fertilization, and abortion for cases involving rape and fetal disability.

Komorowski had sought to portray himself as a conservative during his campaign, but conservative and pro-life commentators were quick to dispel that notion.

Komorowski “shows off as a Catholic with five kids. However, his Catholicism is very specific, as he supports the killing of embryos known as the IVF procedure,” journalist Lukasz Adamski told LifeSiteNews. “Komorowski treats as sacred the rotten ‘abortion compromise’ which excuses the killing of unborn babies just because they happen to be physically and mentally disabled, or were unlucky enough to have been conceived in rape.”

Jacek Sapa, a pro-life activist and current head of the National Day for Life Foundation, noted that life and family advocates saw Komorowski’s conservative presentation “as a superficial image,” and in their experience Komorowski “is not a true conservative, especially not on social issues.”

Pro-life commentator Joanna Najfeld compared Komorowski to former U.S. presidential candidate John Kerry:  He is “a ‘Catholic lite,’ with no views of his own,” she said.  “He can say anything depending on who he’s talking to.”

She added that, in her opinion, Komorowski “would even support abortion on demand and gay ‘marriage’ if that was the popular thing to do. Thankfully, these are not yet popular ideas in Poland.”

“I don’t trust the president-elect. His conservative appearance is just a PR trick,” said Slawomir Olejniczak of Krakow, head of the Polish branch of “Tradition Family Property.”  “I fear very much that from now on, whatever the EU tries to impose on us – wider abortion access, or same-sex marriage – that they will succeed introducing without any resistance on the Polish side.”

Mariusz Dzierzawski, organizer of the Polish branch of the Center for Bioethical Reform’s Genocide Awareness Project, said that the election of a president who supports abortion and IVF “shows that the actions of people of conscience cannot be limited to voting only. We have to actively and continuously shape the public opinion, so that immoral people can no longer prey on the ignorance of the voters.”

Tomasz Terlikowski, editor-in-chief of the Catholic online news service Fronda.pl, wrote in an editorial that “Christians and conservatives are the greatest losers in this election.”

He explained that this is not principally due to Komorowski’s victory over Kaczynski – though he believes the latter is more aligned with Catholic teaching on life and family issues – but because both self-proclaimed ‘conservative’ candidates bowed to the liberal lobby in their campaigns.

“Instead of clearly distancing themselves from liberal ideas, they either evaded clear cut answers (like Jaroslaw Kaczynski did speaking about “personally opposing” IVF) or straight forward supported liberal ideas (like Bronislaw Komorowski did supporting IVF, or signing a bill dangerous for millions of Polish families, or calling for gender quota),” he wrote.

“Sadly, neither the Church hierarchy, nor conservative pro-family leaders confronted this situation loud enough,” he added.
See related LifeSiteNews.com coverage:

“Unprecedented” Threat to Parental Rights in Poland
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2010/feb/10021506.html

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