Pastoral letter opposes gender politics

Poland’s Bishops’ Conference has caused controversy by denouncing the “ideology of gender” and appealing to all Catholics to defend the country against it, writes Jonathan Luxmoore.

“God created men and women – with the great and indispensable gift that, in body and spirit, they should be men for women, and women for men, assigned to married life,” the bishops said in a pastoral letter. “It must therefore arouse the greatest concern that an attempt is now being made to redefine marriage and family, especially by supporters of this ideology of gender, publicised by certain media.”

The letter, read in Polish churches last Sunday, said the “ideology of gender” was “rooted in Marxism and neo-Marxism”. The Government Equal Rights Plenipotentiary, Agnieszka Kozlowska-Rajewicz, accused the Church of inventing the term “gender ideology” as an “imagined enemy”.