Lumen 2018

to consider as, for instance, the office offered to him by the Bishop of Plock in his letter of October 1, 1670. 221 Bishop John Gembicki (†1675), Ordinary of Plock (1655- 1674), invited Fr. Papczynski to his diocese, so that Fr. Stanislaus would become his confessor and spiritual director. He had met Fr. Stanislaus in person after his arrival in Warsaw in 1663. Father Pa- pczynski, too, thought highly of the Bishop of Plock, whom he con- sidered to be a prominent man of the Church and of the Kingdom of Poland. He often met the bishop while he visited his relative or friend, a man by the name John Papczynski, who was the bishop’s valet. It is possible that Fr. Stanislaus was the bishop’s confessor for a few years (1664-1669). 222 The bishop held Fr. Papczynski in high esteem not only as a zealous preacher, but also as a theologian and writer. He wanted to ask Fr. Stanislaus’s opinion about the biogra- phy of his paternal uncle, Laurence Gembicki, Archbishop of Gniezno and Primate of Poland (†1624), which he [the bishop] was preparing for publication. 223 Father Stanislaus, who had other plans for his own future, did not give an affirmative answer to this invitation from the Bishop of Plock or to another one addressed to him in 1671, after he had definitively left the Piarist Order. 224 At this point, it is worthwhile to say a few words about the bishop’s valet, John Papczynski. Evidently he and Fr. Stanislaus shared a bond of intimacy and friendship since John made Fr. Stanis- laus executor of his will. The reader will recall that Fr. Stanislaus, born in 1631 as Papka or Papiec, assumed the name of Papczynski later (around 1646-1649). It is not certain whether these two men by the name Papczynski were relatives in the strict sense of the word. Since, as it seems, John Albert Papczynski’s father lived in Pode- grodzie, it may be presumed that their friendship dated back to the time of their childhood and perhaps the two families shared a bond of friendship. Since Fr. Stanislaus established close ties with Bishop Gembicki, it is possible that one Papczynski helped the other to meet S TANISLAUS P APCZYNSKI 208