The Two Principles of Roman Catholic Church-State Relations

The legislative acts of the Provisional Government regulating the functioning of religious organizations has not been sufficiently studied. The bills, which were created in the various ministries of the Provisional Government and failed to become law, are virtually unexplored. On the wave of political events in Russia in February and March 1917, the nondenominational Provisional Government came to power. There arose the need for a comprehensive reform of public administration in Russia and, in particular, church-state relations. In the bowels of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Provisional Government, there was created a structure that developed the draft laws on the status of various denominations: 1) the group on general religious issues; 2) the commission for the revision of the statutory provisions about the Roman Catholic Church in Russia; and 3) the group on issues relating to the Old Believers. This publication focuses on the activities of this final group. The main outcome of this group, working in close alliance with representatives of the Old Believers, was the creation of the draft law on the “legalization” of the third Orthodox Church in Russia (after the Russian and Georgian Orthodox Churches), that is, the Old Orthodox Belokrinitskaya Hierarchy, which, in 1988, became known as the Russian Orthodox Old Belief Church. The resulting bill, dated 18 October 1917, was submitted to the Provisional Government for approval. However, it was not approved because of the overthrow of the Provisional Government on 25 October of that same year. The present article introduces this 1917 bill to “legalize” the Russian Old Orthodox Belokrinitskaya Hierarchy into scholarly awareness.

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Poland ten years after: the church

Communist and Post-Communist Studies ◽

10.1016/s0967-067x(99)00028-8 ◽

2000 ◽

Vol 33 (1) ◽

pp. 123-146 ◽

Cited By ~ 11

Author(s):

Andrzej Korbonski

Keyword(s):

Religious Education ◽

Catholic Church ◽

Roman Catholic ◽

Roman Catholic Church ◽

Holy See ◽

Church Finances ◽

Abortion Legislation ◽

The One ◽

State Relations ◽

The Church

Ten years after the collapse of communist rule, church-state relations in Poland present a mixed picture. On the one hand, the Roman Catholic church continues to enjoy a privileged position in the country and has achieved most of its cherished goals. On the other hand, its very success carried with it seeds of its future decline. This was particularly true in several areas where the church's aggressive and arrogant behavior has proved counter productive: religious education, anti-abortion legislation, Christian values in mass media, antisemitism, murky church finances, the concordat with the Holy See, and the debate on the new constitution. As a result, there has been a steady decline in popular support for the church which itself has developed some serious rifts in its supposedly united posture. It may be hypothesized that the power and influence of the church actually peaked in the early 1990s and that, having absorbed some of the lessons from its decline, its future policies may well be less triumphalist and controversial, and more accommodating.

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The Roman Catholic Church in Poland and Civil Society:Contradiction or Complementarity?

Religious Studies and Theology ◽

10.1558/rsth.v27i1.21 ◽

2008 ◽

Vol 27 (1) ◽

pp. 21-42

Author(s):

Janusz Mariański

Keyword(s):

Catholic Church ◽

Roman Catholic ◽

Roman Catholic Church

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Popes, Saints, Beato Bones and other Images at War

Postscripts The Journal of Sacred Texts and Contemporary Worlds ◽

10.1558/post.v5i3.337 ◽

2011 ◽

Vol 5 (3) ◽

pp. 337-364

Author(s):

Kristin Norget

Keyword(s):

San Francisco ◽

Catholic Church ◽

Roman Catholic ◽

Moral Authority ◽

Roman Catholic Church ◽

Critical Examination ◽

Peripheral Populations ◽

New Strategy ◽

Catholic History ◽

Local Cultures

This article explores new political practices of the Roman Catholic Church by means of a close critical examination of the beatification of the Martyrs of Cajonos, two indigenous men from the Mexican village of San Francisco Cajonos, Oaxaca, in 2002. The Church’s new strategy to promote an upsurge in canonizations and beatifications forms part of a “war of images,” in Serge Gruzinski’s terms, deployed to maintain apparently peripheral populations within the Church’s central paternalistic fold of social and moral authority and influence, while at the same time as it must be seen to remain open to local cultures and realities. In Oaxaca and elsewhere, this ecclesiastical technique of “emplacement” may be understood as an attempt to engage indigenous-popular religious sensibilities and devotion to sacred images while at the same time implicitly trying to contain them, weaving their distinct local historical threads seamlessly into the fabric of a global Catholic history.

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DIALOG Z HUMANIZMEM RENESANSOWYM W DZIEŁACH PIOTRA SKARGI / PIOTR SKARGA’S DIALOGUE WITH RENAISSANCE HUMANISM

Ruch Literacki ◽

10.2478/v10273-012-0078-z ◽

2013 ◽

Vol 54 (4-5) ◽

pp. 405-424

Author(s):

Alina Nowicka -Jeżowa

Keyword(s):

Catholic Church ◽

Roman Catholic ◽

Roman Catholic Church ◽

Ignatian Spirituality ◽

Clear Cut ◽

Renaissance Humanism ◽

Cultural Conditions ◽

Political Views ◽

The City ◽

The Church

Summary The article tries to outline the position of Piotr Skarga in the Jesuit debates about the legacy of humanist Renaissance. The author argues that Skarga was fully committed to the adaptation of humanist and even medieval ideas into the revitalized post-Tridentine Catholicism. Skarga’s aim was to reformulate the humanist worldview, its idea of man, system of values and political views so that they would fit the doctrine of the Roman Catholic church. In effect, though, it meant supplanting the pluralist and open humanist culture by a construct as solidly Catholic as possible. He sifted through, verified, and re-interpreted the humanist material: as a result the humanist myth of the City of the Sun was eclipsed by reminders of the transience of all earthly goods and pursuits; elements of the Greek and Roman tradition were reconnected with the authoritative Biblical account of world history; and man was reinscribed into the theocentric perspective. Skarga brought back the dogmas of the original sin and sanctifying grace, reiterated the importance of asceticism and self-discipline, redefined the ideas of human dignity and freedom, and, in consequence, came up with a clear-cut, integrist view of the meaning and goal of the good life as well as the proper mission of the citizen and the nation. The polemical edge of Piotr Skarga’s cultural project was aimed both at Protestantism and the Erasmian tendency within the Catholic church. While strongly coloured by the Ignatian spirituality with its insistence on rigorous discipline, a sense of responsibility for the lives of other people and the culture of the community, and a commitment to the heroic ideal of a miles Christi, taking headon the challenges of the flesh, the world, Satan, and the enemies of the patria and the Church, it also went a long way to adapt the Jesuit model to Poland’s socio-cultural conditions and the mentality of its inhabitants.

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