“100th Anniversary of the Concordat between the Holy See and the Republic of Poland”
Narodowy Bank Polski is putting into circulation a silver collector coin with a face value of 20 złoty.
Narodowy Bank Polski has announced that silver collector coins “100th Anniversary of the Concordat between the Holy See and the Republic of Poland” will be available on sale as of tomorrow.
The coin with a face value of 20 złoty is made of 999 purity silver, has the dimensions of 40.00×28.00 millimetres and weighs 28.28 grams. It has been minted in up to 8,000 pieces.
The coins are sold at all the NBP regional branches and in the NBP online shop Kolekcjoner at the price of PLN 390.
The reverse of the coin depicts the silhouettes of Pope Pius XI and President Stanisław Wojciechowski, whose signatures appear on the ratification document. The obverse of the coin features the imprint of the state seal of the Republic of Poland on the last page of the original document of ratification in French, as well as an extract from the text: “Salut: Un Concordat entre le Saint-Siège et la République de Pologne ayant été signé à Rome le dix Février mil neuf cent vingt cinq, Concordat, dont la teneur suit:” (On the tenth day of February, one thousand nine hundred and twenty-five, the Concordat between the Holy See and the Republic of Poland was signed in Rome, word for word as follows:).
The concordat between the Holy See and the Republic of Poland was concluded on 10 February 1925, after only six months of negotiations. The main negotiator on the Polish side was Minister Stanisław Grabski, leader of the National Democracy Party and brother of the then Prime Minister Władysław Grabski. This is how he recalled his audience with Pope Pius XI, a friend of Poland, who served as Apostolic Nuncio to Poland as Achille Ratti from 1919 to 1921: “He told me that he was happy to grant the Polish state more powers than any other modern concordat gives to the state authority, because he knows how difficult the situation of Poland is due to its geographical position, and that for the entire Christian world, it is necessary for Poland to be as strong as possible.” These words have not lost their relevance.
Both Russia and Germany contested the Treaty of Versailles that ended World War I and the accompanying peace documents. In 1925, Poland had to pursue a defensive policy because of Germany’s demanding policy, which denied Poland’s rights to western lands through diplomacy and economic pressure. On the other hand, special vigilance also had to be exercised vis-à-vis Soviet Russia – linked to Germany since 1922 by the anti-Versailles Treaty of Rapallo – due to the transfer of communist agitators across the border, striving to separate the eastern parts of Polish territory.
The international agreement between the Second Polish Republic and the Holy See, and with it the permanent division of the territory of the reborn Poland into metropolises and dioceses, strengthened the stability of its borders, while for the Catholic majority it gave a sense of identification with the free homeland. Therefore, at the ratification of the concordat by the parliament, even the left – hostile to the agreement and in favour of the separation of the Church and the State – did not decide to ostentatiously vote against its signing. Some MPs abstained from voting. On the other hand, representatives of the national Christian democratic and conservative parties, as well as the People’s Party ‘Piast’, accepted the agreement in the vote with undisguised satisfaction.
In September 1945, the authorities imposed by Moscow unilaterally broke the concordat of 1925. The new agreement came into being only after Poland regained its independence, during the pontificate of St John Paul II, in 1993. To this day, it is a guarantee of the nation’s proper understanding of the extraordinary role of Catholicism on the Polish lands.
More information can be found in the brochure.
NBP collector coins and banknotes are sold in commercial packaging with an attached certificate.
The next issue is scheduled on 6 March 2025. On that day Narodowy Bank Polski will be putting into circulation a gold collector coin “Banknotes in Circulation in Poland” – “The 50 Złoty Note”, with a face value of 50 złoty.
Contact:
Contact for collectors: e-mail kolekcjoner@nbp.pl, tel. +48 22 185 17 05
Contact for the media: e-mail press@nbp.pl, tel. +48 22 185 2012
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About NBP
Narodowy Bank Polski holds the exclusive right to issue banknotes and coins in Poland. All currency issued by NBP, including collector banknotes and coins, is legal tender in Poland. Issuing collector items is an occasion to commemorate historic figures and anniversaries as well as to develop the interest of the public in Polish culture, science and tradition.
High-resolution images of the coins: https://nbp.pl/en/coins-and-banknotes/collector-coins/catalogue/