In 1955, the Supreme Sacred Congregation of the Holy Office condemned Bolesław Piasecki’s collection of articles entitled Zagadnienia istotne (Essential Issues), published a year earlier, as well as the weekly “Dziś i Jutro” (“Today and Tommorow”), which had been published in Warsaw since 1945. In this way, the Holy See left no illusions about the lack of ecclesiastical legitimacy for the discourse of circles which defined themselves at the time as “socially progressive Catholics” and which supported the communist transformation of the country. In writing and publishing Zagadnienia istotne, Piasecki was carrying out a complex intellectual and semiotic operation. One of its aims was to systemically justify the shape of this specific discourse, which promoted a space for the co-occurrence of two axiologies: Marxist-Leninist and Catholic. In the preface to the book, Piasecki attempted to reconcile contradictions contained in the two worldviews and to eliminate the paradoxes that arose as a result. An analysis of the evaluations drawn up by the clergymen entrusted by the Holy Office to write an opinion prior to the issuing of the decree makes it possible to reconstruct the manner in which Piasecki’s text was read from a dogmatic perspective. It also allows us to trace the arguments and techniques by which the authors of the reviews upheld the worldview modified by the author of the book.
