“We wish to support the family in its traditional functions. We want the family, on the one hand supported by our faith, and on the other a fundamental element of our culture, to resist the current crisis”, said the head of the Polish government, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, on opening a recent seminar on family policies adopted by the relative majority Law and Justice party (Prawo i Sprawiedliwosc – PIS) in the Parliament in Warsaw. The family support programme approved by the government provides for an extension of maternity leave from the current 18 to 26 weeks, tax breaks depending on the number of family members, a significant increase in tax deductions for families with several children to bring up, and an improvement of health care provision for children and pregnant women. One of the government’s projects in course of implementation concerns the closing of orphanages and the introduction of policies for the support of adoptive families. Provision is also made for free kindergartens and nursery schools with an extension of their opening hours up to 18 per day. The Council for the family of the Polish episcopate recently made an appeal to all Catholics to make every effort to ensure that “the defence of life be constitutionally guaranteed”. “We must all defend human life”, says the statement which was issued in the run up to the parliamentary debate on the introduction into the Polish Constitution of the principle of the defence of life, from conception to natural death. The authors of the appeal emphasise that the question of life is “of paramount importance for the whole nation and for the Church”. The appeal, issued on behalf of all the members of the Council, was signed by its chairman, Bishop Kazimierz Gorny of Rzeszow.
