After his death a revolt against Christianity and the reigning family broke out, the new Church organization of Poland disappeared from view, and the names of the Bishops of Wrocław for the next half century are unknown.

In 1163 the sons of the exiled Polish duke Władysław returned from the Empire and, through the intervention of Emperor Frederick Barbarossa, received as an independent duchy the part of Silesia which was included at that date in the see of Wrocław.

The monasteries of the Augustinian Canons, Premonstratensians and Cistercians took an active part in carrying out the schemes of the rulers by placing great numbers of Germans, especially Thuringians and Franconians, on the large estates that had been granted them.

One of the most noted bishops of the diocese, Tomasz I (1232–68), continued the work of German colonization with so much energy that even the first Mongol invasion of Poland (1241) made but a temporary break in the process.

The two candidates, Wit and Lutold, elected by the opposing factions, finally resigned, and Pope John XXII transferred Nanker of Kraków to Wrocław (1326–41).

He held two synods, in 1410 and 1415, with the object of securing a higher standard of ecclesiastical discipline; and he settled the right of inheritance in the territory under his dominion by promulgating the church decree called "Wenceslaus' law".

By wise economy Bishop Peter succeeded in bringing the diocesan finances into a better condition and in redeeming the greater part of the church lands which his predecessor had been obliged to mortgage.

His love of peace made his position a very difficult one during the fierce ecclesiastic-political contention that raged between the Hussite King of Bohemia, George of Poděbrady, and the people of Breslau, who had taken sides with the German party.

As papal legate, Rudolf had become popular in Breslau through his energetic opposition to George of Podebrady; for this reason the cathedral chapter requested his transfer from the small Diocese of Lavant in Carinthia, after he had confirmed their privileges.

John V took an active part in the intellectual life of the time and sought at the diocesan synods to promote learning and church discipline, and to improve the schools.

Princes, nobles, and town councils were zealous promoters of the new belief; even in the episcopal principality of Neisse (Nysa)-Grottkau (Grodków) Protestant doctrines found approval and acceptance.

Jacob von Salza (1520–39) was personally a stanch adherent of the Church; yet the gentleness of his disposition caused him to shrink from carrying on a war against the powerful religious movement that had arisen.

Casper von Logau (1562–74) showed at first greater energy than his predecessor in endeavouring to compose the troubles of his distracted diocese, but later in his episcopate his attitude towards Lutheranism and his slackness in defending church rights gave great offence to those who had remained true to the Faith.

At the assemblies of the nobles and at the meetings of the diet, the bishops and the deputies of the cathedral chapter were, as a rule, the only Catholics against a large and powerful majority on the side of Protestantism.

The Habsburg suzerains, who lived far from Silesia (in Vienna or Prague), and who were constantly preoccupied by the danger of a Turkish invasion, were not in a position to enforce the edicts which they issued for the protection of the Church.

Johann VI (1600–8), a member of a noble family of Silesia named von Sitsch, took more severe measures than his predecessors against Protestantism, in the hope of checking it, especially in the episcopal principality of Neisse-Grottkau.

During talks with Władysław in mid-1619, the Habsburgs promised to agree to a temporary occupation of part of Silesia by Polish forces, which the unsuccessfully Vasas hoped would later allow the re-incorporation of those areas into Poland.

The work was completed by his successor, Charles Ferdinand, Prince of Poland (1625–55), who spent most of his time in his own country, but appointed excellent administrators for the diocese, such as the Coadjutor-Bishop Liesch von Hornau, and Archdeacon Gebauer.

But when King Charles XII of Sweden secured for the Protestants the right to their former possessions in these territories, by the Treaty of Altranstädt, in 1707, the secularization came to an end, and the churches had to be returned.

In utter disregard of the principles of the Church, and heedless of the protests of the cathedral chapter, he presented Count Philipp Gotthard von Schaffgotsch as coadjutor-bishop.

During the Seven Years' War he fell into discredit with Frederick on account of his firm maintenance of the rights of the Church, and the return of peace did not fully restore him to favour.

Prince-Bishop von Sedlnitzky was neither clear nor firm in his maintenance of the doctrines of the Church; on the question of mixed marriages, which had become one of great importance, he took an undecided position.

Pope Leo XIII appointed as his successor in the disordered diocese Robert Herzog (1882–86), who had been Prince-Episcopal Delegate for Brandenburg and Pomerania and provost of St. Hedwig's in Berlin.

According to the census of 1 December 1905, the German part of Breslau diocesan area, including the prince-episcopal delegation, comprised 3,342,221 Catholics; 8,737,746 Protestants; and 204,749 Jews.

On 28 October 1925 Pope Pius XI elevated that apostolic administration to the new diocese of Katowice with Bishop August Hlond, then a suffragan of Kraków, by the papal Bull Vixdum Poloniae Unitas.

Bertram died on 6 July 1945 in Jánský Vrch castle in Czechoslovakia, supposedly due to the Polish demands upon him (an ethnic German, who, however, had pleaded for German-Polish reconciliation during the time of Piłsudski's rule).

[citation needed] On 16 July 1945 the archdiocesan chapter, still comprising nine members, elected the Polish-speaking Ferdinand Piontek as capitular vicar, whom the Gestapo had banned from Breslau in early February 1945.

The Holy See refused to acknowledge Polish Catholic Church claims, however, and only appointed auxiliary bishops to the Archdiocese of Kraków in order to serve the Poles, who remained in Silesia and those who settled in the region.

So Bolesław Kominek was appointed to the archiepiscopal see, becoming its first Polish bishop since Leopold Graf Sedlnitzky Choltitz von Odrowąż, a Polish-Austrian nobleman, who had resigned from the see in 1840.

[7] On November 6, 2020, The Holy See's nuncio to Poland announced that following a Vatican investigation regarding sex abuse allegations, prominent Cardinal Henryk Gulbinowicz, the former Archbishop of Wroclaw whose support of the trade union Solidarity played a critical role in the collapse of communism in Poland,[8] was now "barred from any kind of celebration or public meeting and from using his episcopal insignia, and is deprived of the right to a cathedral funeral and burial.