Anti-communist opposition priest and Solidarity chaplain Stanislaw Malkowski dies at 82

Priesthood and anti-communist opposition

Father Stanislaw Malkowski died on the night of 7 September 2026 at age 82 in his family home in the Diocese of Warszawa-Praga. The Archdiocese of Warsaw announced his death on 8 September, stating that funeral arrangements will be released at a later date. Born on 29 July 1944 in Wola Korytnicka near Wegrow, Malkowski grew up in Warsaw after his family moved there in late 1945. He completed a degree in sociology at the University of Warsaw and initially entered a Benedictine monastery in Tyniec in 1964. He joined the Higher Metropolitan Seminary in Warsaw in 1970 and was ordained a priest on 22 December 1974 by Auxiliary Bishop Zbigniew Kraszewski. His dissident activity began during his student years, including his participation in the March 1968 student strikes, which resulted in a temporary university expulsion. During the 1970s, he collaborated with the Workers' Defence Committee and the Movement for Defense of Human and Citizen Rights, signed the Letter of 59 against communist constitutional revisions in December 1975, and participated in a hunger strike across Warsaw churches from 3 to 10 October 1979.

Partnership with Father Popieluszko and state targeting

While studying at the Warsaw seminary, Malkowski formed a close friendship and collaboration with Father Jerzy Popieluszko. The two priests organized pastoral outreach at St. Anne's and Res Sacra Miser on Krakowskie Przedmiescie. In August 1980, Malkowski took part in the workers' strike at the Gdansk Shipyard, subsequently becoming a chaplain for the Solidarity trade union. Beginning in 1982, Malkowski and Popieluszko jointly celebrated monthly Masses for the Homeland at the Church of St. Stanislaw Kostka in Warsaw's Zoliborz district, attracting crowds of worshippers. Malkowski also organized Katyn memorial masses and gatherings at Romuald Traugutt Park and the Olszynka Grochowska monument. These activities made him a frequent target of the communist secret service (Sluzba Bezpieczenstwa), leading to multiple detentions and interrogations. On 13 December 1981, when the authorities declared martial law, Malkowski was the only Catholic priest in Warsaw detained by the secret police. Early in the 1980s, the Fourth Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs placed his name at number one on a surveillance list of unruly priests drawn up for Colonel Adam Pietruszka, with Popieluszko listed in the second position.

Pastoral appointments and later activity

Throughout his priesthood, Malkowski served across numerous parishes in Warsaw, Skierniewice, Zabki, Prudnik, and Poznan, following a brief novitiate year with the Dominican Order in the mid-1970s. From 1979 to 1991, he served as a chaplain for children with disabilities in the Faith and Light movement, and in 1983 he took on chaplaincy duties at Warsaw's Northern Communal Cemetery. In the post-communist period, Malkowski contributed articles as a commentator for publications including Nasza Polska and Warszawska Gazeta. In the summer of 2010, following the Smolensk presidential plane crash, he led regular evening prayer gatherings in front of the Presidential Palace and blessed the commemorative wooden cross on 3 August 2010. On 11 November 2021, Polish President Andrzej Duda awarded Malkowski the Order of the White Eagle, Poland's highest state decoration.

In recognition of distinguished merits in pastoral work, for the heroic attitude of a Solidarity chaplain supporting with word and deed the struggle for an independent and just Poland, standing on the side of good and truth in defense of inalienable human rights.

Malkowski retired from active clerical ministry in July 2022, living in his family home on the territory of the Diocese of Warszawa-Praga until his death.