Klerykal Fiction
Entry updated 12 May 2025. Tagged: Theme.
Polish term for a subgenre of Polish Fantastika dealing with Religion. It is often associated with works of fiction (mostly sf) critical of religion; however, there are dissenting views. The term entered Polish sf critical discourse by the mid-1990s, and has been attributed to Tomasz Kołodziejczak, although the general phenomenon of a new wave of Polish works critical of religion was commented upon as early as 1991.
Some context about Poland is necessary to understand this genre. Poland is one of the most religious (Catholic) European countries. In the nineteenth century, religiosity in Poland became closely intertwined with patriotism. Being religious became a way to stress one's Polishness in the face of the neighboring countries (mainly Protestant Germany and Orthodox Russia) that had for over a century occupied Poland and tried to culturally assimilate its populace. After two short decades of interwar independence,religiosity was once again used for most of the second half of the twentieth century to evince dissent against the atheist communist party and its Soviet overlords. After the fall of communism in Central and Eastern Europe in 1989, Poland transitioned into democracy, and pro-Church and pro-Christian views, no longer censored in the public sphere, proliferated, with the Church also making a bid for political power. This, however, led to a backlash, and Poland quickly became an ongoing site of culture wars, in which Western European leftist progressivism, multiculturalism, and atheism clashed with the country's rightist conservatism, nationalism, and religiosity. This conflict became reflected in fiction, including sf, with some authors embracing religiosity while others criticizing it.
A common theme in these latter works was the more or less overt criticism of institutions similar to or directly identified with the Roman Catholic Church. The church portrayed in such stories has been generally shown as overbearing, dominating politics and often invading privacy. In some works of this genre, visions of a theocratic, totalitarian Poland emerged. This anti-religious fiction, critical of and opposed to broadly understood religious authority, can seen as the classic, narrow, and most common definition of klerykal fiction.
Confusingly, however, works from the other side of the spectrum have also been classified as klerykal fiction, as some later critics, coming from the traditionalist, rightist, and Christian side of the spectrum, have used this term to classify works simultaneously described (by Natalia Budzyńska as early as 1999) as "siding with Christianity, showing authentic faith, or permeated with evangelical content, including pro-life themes" as well as "fervently religious in the best sense and thoroughly permeated with evangelical content". Crucially, such works still generally retain elements of criticism of the Church but serve as a cautionary tale against its potential corruption and degeneration into a hypocritical body that no longer serves God or the faithful. Those works also often display currents of anti-European Union and anti-immigrant sentiment, seeing Western liberal values as well as competition from religious (mostly Muslim) immigrants as major threats to the Church and Polish religiosity.
Borrowing the concept of linguistic reclamation – appropriation of a pejorative epithet by its target(s) – we can classify works of pro-religious or pro-Christian fiction that serve as the warning to the Church and faithful to remain devout as belonging to a newer definition of klerykal fiction (which arguably should receive a different monicker, perhaps "Christian warning fiction", or "pro-klerykal fiction"; with the former, traditional body of works classified as "anti-klerykal fiction").
A synthesis of these two bodies of work is fortunately possible. The above two definitions are nearly contradictory except for a key recurring theme – harsh scrutiny of religious institutions. Writers from the progressive, liberal left are critical of the present-day Church they feel is overly influential in modern Polish society, while writers associated with the traditional, Christian right instead warn the Church not to reform and lose its identity. Combining these two subgenres, we can arrive at a broader, unifying definition of klerykal fiction as a genre of Polish speculative fiction and broader religious fiction critical of the Church (given the Polish context – Catholic Church, in particular) as an institution. Such fiction addresses religious (effectively, Christian) themes, is concerned with the present and future of religious institutions (i.e. the Church), and comprises two effectively opposing bodies of work: one that is anti-clerical ("anty-klerykal"), and another that is pro-Christian ("pro-klerykal").
Finally, it is worth noting that some writers and scholars have given very broad definitions of the term klerykal fiction, which make it indistinguishable from the concept of religious (science) fiction. Such overly broad definitions are rather useless, failing to engage with the more interesting characteristics of the genre discussed above.
Regarding formative writers and history, this genre is generally be seen as having arisen in early 1990s. Two short stories are often pointed to as formative for the genre. First is Jacek Dukaj's debut, "Złota galera" (February 1990 Fantastyka; trans Wiesiek Powaga as "The Golden Galley" in The Dedalus Book of Polish Fantasy, anth 1996 ed Powaga), one of the relatively few works of Polish sf translated into English. In it, a space-faring Terran Empire encounters an existential threat in the form of the titular golden Spaceship, crewed by devils, and sent by Satan towards Earth. The other is Rafał Ziemkiewicz's "Jawnogrzesznica" ["The Public Sinner"] in Jawnogrzesznica (anth 1991). Set in Near Future Poland, it portrays the country as a theocracy run by the corrupt church. The titular character, a prostitute, is shown as having genuine faith, but she is denied entry to an event where the Second Coming is supposed to happen; ironically, the character implied to be the returned Jesus Christ, who is trying to help her, is also not allowed in.
Both of these works have been discussed by critics as belonging to both the "anti-klerykal" subgenre, and to the "pro-klerykal" one. They have been followed by a few dozen works identified as belonging to this genre; although due to contradictory definitions, which I elaborated upon above, the term has been used to describe works that are pro-Christian, rabidly anti-religious, as well as simply just broadly related to the religious science fiction. The task to categorize each work of Polish religious science fiction as "pro-klerykal", "anty-klerykal", or "just religious science fiction", remains not yet done by anyone, and relying on past categorizations is not very helpful, due to this term having more than a single accepted meaning.
As such, some critics believe that the subgenre became less common from the late 1990s onward, and some even consider it extinct or purely historical, limited to just the early 1990s. However, no work exists in a vacuum. Religion as a theme in Polish works of science fiction existed long before 1990, despite the communist authorities' dislike of this theme. The earliest work named as a precursor to klerykal fiction by Budzyńska was Stanisław Lem's Głos Pana (1968; trans Michael Kandel as His Master's Voice 1983); however, earlier relevant works exist, such as Jan Dobraczyński's Wyczerpać morze ["Empty the Sea"] (1961) (a novel about the rebuilding of the Church following a nuclear war that devastated Europe) or even the classic Lunar Trilogy (1903-19211) by Jerzy Żuławski. Unsurprisingly, religious themes in Polish science fiction persist to this day; several critics consider the best works of this genre to be philosophical or metaphysical texts tackling religious concepts in the science fiction format, penned by Marek S Huberath between the late 1990s to early 2000s. As time never stops, one can constantly identify more recent works in Polish science fiction that are both pro- and anti-religious or simply just concerned with the topic of religion. However, none have become as influential or genre (re)defining as the formative stories by Dukaj and Ziemkiewicz.
The most recent work belonging to this more broadly understood subgenre would include Konrad T Lewandowski's novels such as Anioły muszą odejść ["Angels Must Leave"] (2011), Czas egzorcystów ["Time of the Exorcists"] (2014), Utopie ["The Utopias"] (2014) and Michał Gołkowski's Komornik ["The Repossession Man"] series (2016-2023) about a "failed Apocalypse". Another enduring relevant work would be the rare Fantasy/Alternate History take on this genre, the lengthy Cykl Inkwizytorski ["The Inquisitor Cycle"] (2003-2023) of Jacek Piekara; in that universe, with stories set in the alternate Middle Ages, Christ refuses to be crucified, instead unleashing his powers on his torturers and leading a religious revolution.
A digression on naming. English-language critics have not noticed this subgenre until now. One Polish critic Stanisław Krawczyk suggested that in English, it could be referred to more idiomatically as clerical fiction. However, when that term is used in English discourse, it broadly denotes fiction featuring clergy as protagonists; and an associated term, "clerisy", has an entirely secular import. In the Polish language, "klerykal fiction", a fake Anglicism, is commonly used – as are others, such as political fiction, weird fiction, or science fiction, that often co-exist with Polish language equivalents. Polish names for this genre have been occasionally penned by critics (fantastyka klerykalna, fantastyka antyklerykalna) but remain rare. Given that the term is, however, primarily used to describe sf (and occasionally other close genres), one could argue that more accurately, we might call it "klerykal Fantastika", to accord with the frequent use of that word in this encyclopedia; but this seems unnecessary. The vast majority of Polish discourse about this concept uses the term "klerykal fiction", for better or worse, and it so appears here. [PKo]
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