The policy proposals were unveiled at a conference at the weekend, Polish state news agency PAP reported.
Leading left-wing politician Włodzimierz Czarzasty said on Saturday: “A lay state is a condition for freedom in Poland ... Women will never have their rights until the principles of a secular state are introduced in Poland.”
He added that the Catholic Church was "covering up instances of paedophilia among its priests, merely moving the culprits to different parishes," while church income remained untaxed, giving priests a privileged position.
Czarzasty also said that Poland’s Catholic Church "influenced the content" of the country’s laws on abortion, contraception and a ban on Sunday trade, among other regulations.
During Saturday’s conference, Poland's Left alliance outlined a range of policy proposals "to fully separate the church from the state" ahead of parliamentary elections scheduled for the autumn.
The key proposals include renegotiating the 1993 Concordat agreement between Poland and the Vatican; establishing a special commission to investigate paedophilia among church officials and ensure the payment of compensation to victims; and introducing a tax on priests’ income.
The group also said that religious education classes should be made non-compulsory and that the government should withdraw its funding for these classes and instead finance extra English classes for students, for instance.
Other proposals include scrapping the prohibition against offending religious feelings; removing crosses and other religious symbols from public agencies, schools and hospitals; and abolishing the “conscience clause” whereby a doctor can refuse to terminate a pregnancy, or prescribe prenatal checkups and hormonal contraceptives, due to their personal views, the PAP news agency reported.
Protests over abortion rights
Last month, protest marches were held in many Polish cities to demand a relaxation of abortion rules following the death of a pregnant woman who should have been offered an abortion to save her life, according to experts.
Poland's conservative leader Jarosław Kaczyński said at the time that, despite a toughening of abortion regulations in 2020, abortion in Poland “remains legal when a woman’s life or health is in danger,” the PAP news agency reported.
Abortion is allowed in Poland only when the pregnancy endangers the life or health of the woman or if it is a result of "a forbidden act," such as rape or incest.
In March, Polish lawmakers rejected a bill that would have restricted the country's abortion law by imposing prison terms on those aiding terminations.
In December 2021, Polish MPs voted down a proposal that would have outlawed abortion by defining it as homicide.
The country's abortion regulations were last modified after its Constitutional Tribunal in October 2020 ruled that abortion due to serious fetal defects and severe illnesses was unconstitutional.
The ruling prompted a wave of protests across the country.
Poland’s next general election is scheduled for the autumn. The exact date will be set by the president, with October 15 the earliest constitutionally possible date, according to news outlets.
(pm/gs)
Source: PAP, TVP Info
Click on the audio player above for a report by Radio Poland's Michał Owczarek.