The extraordinary story of Justyna Steczkowska’s family. Her father was a priest!

The story of Justyna Steczkowska’s father

Justyna Steczkowska comes from a large family – she has eight siblings. Her father, before he met his future wife, served as a priest. In Agata Steczkowska’s book, we read about what life was like for this unusual family. After leaving the clerical state, Stanisław Steczkowski married Justyna’s mother, Danuta, many years after the birth of his children.

Uncovering a family secret

Agata Steczkowska decided to write a book about her family, persuaded by her father. “My father, after reading my thesis, urged me to publish a book about our family history. He said he would be happy if he lived to see the days when this book would be published. I told him then that what I liked best was the love story of my parents. ‘Write the way it really was,’ he repeated,” she confessed to TVP Weekly. In the book, Agatha describes how she found out that her father was a priest. The secret, which many might have found controversial, was a source of pride for her.

I am the child of a priest. My sisters and brothers were born when my dad was no longer a priest. From Jack downwards, that is, my eight siblings who were born after me, were all already registered as children of Danuta and Stanislaw Steczkowski. I was registered at birth as Danuta Wyżkiewicz’s child. I never bothered about it.

I’

m glad that I’m a priest’s child, because it means that my father sought deep spirituality.

Secrets from the past

Agata Steczkowska describes that she found out about her origins in a painful way from a stranger on the street. I was

told this by a woman on the street. I was 14 years old and I was suddenly told that I was repulsive and that I was a priest’s child, a child of sin. I felt like someone had hit me. I went home and asked my mum if I was a child of sin. Mummy looked at me calmly and replied: you are a child of love, remember that,” she recalls.

This experience taught her not to pay attention to the taunts of others and made her immune to the mischief that still occurred from time to time.

The long wait for the wedding

The book `Steczkowskis. Love against the rule. A personal biography of the family” also contains information about Stanislaw and Danuta Steczkowski’s long wait for the Church’s permission to marry. The couple had to wait as long as 32 years to be officially married, which happened three years before Stanislaw’s death.