Kościół olkuski w reprezentatywnym raporcie Służby Bezpieczeństwa z 1960 roku

This article contains information and analysis of the Security Service's operational activities against the Catholic Church in Olkusz, based on an archival document produced by the security apparatus. The territory in question belonged administratively to the Krakow Province, while in the church administration it belonged to the Diocese of Kielce. The document includes a number of important issues: a description of the Catholic Church in Olkusz, including deaneries, and the description and staffing of individual religious congregations (for which the security police also kept up-to-date documentation); Catholic activities, being part of the structures of the church organization of individual deaneries and their parishes; a current list of Catholic agents and assets; agent cases conducted against individual church objects and the clergy; repression of the clergy; issues of catechization; cases of religious construction; cooperation between the security division and civic militia; difficulties in the work of the Olkusz security service in church matters; and “hotspots” in Olkusz. Thanks to the agents it acquired, the security apparatus had current information on the functioning of the church in Olkusz, especially the clergy. Therefore, it could effectively watch over the church’s activities, neutralize many of its intentions, and punish defiant clergy in various ways. This edited archival document illustrates a wide range of issues dealt with by the Security Service of the 1960s. Its form, and this systematic range of issues, was imposed from above and was compulsory throughout the entire territory of the People's Republic of Poland