Who May Come to Czestochowa?

As the Ecumenical Council ended in Rome last month, the Polish delegation headed by Stefan Cardinal Wyszynski, acting in the truest spirit of Christian reconciliation, invited East and West Germany's 54 bishops, archbishops and cardinals to attend the ceremonies in Czestochowa next May marking the 1,000th anniversary of the conversion of Poland's King Mieczyslaw I. Wrote the Polish churchmen: "We grant forgiveness and ask forgiveness. Let us forget. No polemics. No more cold war."

The invitation was gratefully accepted, but the gesture to the hated Germans left Poland's Communist regime sputtering with rage. Just how seriously Party Boss Wladyslaw Gomulka was taking it became clear last week when the government refused to allow Cardinal Wyszynski to leave Poland for a trip to Rome. The reason, explained an officer, was that on his last trip there the Cardinal had engaged in political activity harmful to Poland.

Gomulka's hard line raised doubts that he would issue visas for the German churchmen to enter Poland. And it obviously reduced the chances that some way would be found to extend an invitation to Pope Paul VI, who wishes to go to Czestochowa.

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