Warsaw, Poland - Three people have notified prosecutors after Polish priest Tadeusz Rydzyk made a controversial comment to a black missionary during a pilgrimage, the Polish Press Agency reported Thursday. MP Janusz Palikot and two others notified prosecutors after a comment Rydzyk made on July 12, during a pilgrimage to a shrine in Czestochowa. The conservative priest said, "God ... Look, he hasn't washed at all," when a black missionary took the stage during a welcome ceremony.
The missionary appeared to laugh and then thanked the sponsoring radio station for what he learned about Poland.
Palikot said the comment was racist and deliberate, and could not be interpreted as a harmless joke.
"(The comment) isn't the first of an anti-Semitic or racist character," on Rydzyk's radio station, Palikot wrote in his notice to prosecutors. "Not reacting to such behavior is consenting in propagation of racism and could have tragic consequences."
Rydzyk founded the Roman Catholic radio station Radio Maryja and was in Czestochowa to promote his new Catholic mobile phone company.
Czestochowa is a popular destination for pilgrims, and houses the religious icon Black Madonna painting.