Mercy of Karol Wojtyła

“He had two shirts, one he had given away to a returnee and the other he had to wash and sometimes he would wear it while it was still wet.” That is the story about a clerical student from Kraków, Karol Wojtyła, as told by Pr. Jerzy Bryła, later a graduate of the seminary. After the World War II, many returnees from the East went to Kraków, left with nothing by the USSR. With one of them Wojtyła shared his humble wardrobe.

At the time, Karol Wojtyła was involved in a charity work in an organised way, he was the vice-president of “Bratniak”, a Brotherly Help of Jagiellonian University Students. The association started during the partition period in Poland, reactivated in 1945, and after the war its members’ hands were full. They were acquiring and dispensing anything that was needed: ration stamps, money, clothes and even accommodation. The professor in charge of the association was Prof. Stanisław Pigoń, known Polish literature historian. He appointed Karol Wojtyła, whom he had known, to be a part of its council. The Secretary was a friend of Karol’s, Andrzej Deskur, who would go on to become a cardinal and work in the Rome curia. It is worth mentioning that clerical students at that time were considered students of the Theology Faculty of Jagiellonian University. Later, in 1954, the Polish United Work Party would remove Theology Faculty from the university.