scholarly journals Persistence and Change in Morality Policy: The Role of the Catholic Church in the Politics of Abortion in Ireland and Poland

2020 ◽  
Vol 124 (1) ◽  
pp. 86-102 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sydney Calkin ◽  
Monika Ewa Kaminska

On the issue of abortion, Ireland and Poland have been among the most conservative countries in Europe. Their legal and cultural approaches to this issue have been deeply influenced by the institution of the Catholic Church and its purported role as a defender of an authentic national identity. However, their political climates for abortion reform are increasingly divergent: Ireland has liberalised its abortion law substantially since 2018, while Poland is moving towards further criminalisation with the repeated introduction of restrictive laws in parliament. Both have seen active pro-choice movements who mobilise for reform and widespread non-compliance with their restrictive abortion laws, but the policy impact of these trends varies significantly. What accounts for this difference? This article draws on comparative analysis of Ireland and Poland to assess their divergent trajectories on abortion reform, arguing that the most significant driver of change between the two is the disparity in influence of the Catholic Church on politics and policymaking.

2014 ◽  
Vol 94 (4) ◽  
pp. 479-504 ◽  
Author(s):  
Miranda Zapor Cruz

Over the course of nine centuries in Lithuania, the Catholic Church transitioned from military threat, to foreign occupier, to key component of national identity. This article will take an historical look at the Catholic Church in Lithuania and the process by which Catholic faith became culturally and politically embedded in Lithuanian national identity. An examination of the interplay between the Catholic Church and the Lithuanian nation demonstrates that the Church was instrumental in the formation and growth of national identity, which reached its climax in the close identification of Catholicism with nationalism in the anti-Soviet dissent movements of the 1980s and 1990s.


2021 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 19-35
Author(s):  
Bogusław Śliwerski

Pedagogy of the Primate of the Millennium, Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński An analysis of source texts and selected biographical studies of Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński was carried out from the perspectives of the processes of secularization taking place in Poland in the year AD 2020, the radical attacks of left-wing politicians on the Catholic Church and its relationship with the current governing coalition known as the United Right [Zjednoczona Prawica]. This strikes at the foundations of the Second Vatican Council and the role of the Polish Church in regaining the nation’s freedom from socialist domination in 1989. The author therefore recalls not only the exceptional merits of the Polish Primate during the period of totalitarianism of the „People’s Poland” [Polska Ludowa], but also his message to educator-practitioners, parents, and scientists.


Vox Patrum ◽  
2003 ◽  
Vol 42 ◽  
pp. 319-325
Author(s):  
Stanisław Koczwara

Taking over the throne in 518 by the Emperor Justin I impacted on the emperor's court to change politics in order to support of the Chalcedonian Synod. The most important thing was that, the Emperor as well as his supporting courtiers, took into consideration the main role of the Apostolic See in protecting truth religion. Courtly guardians of Chalcedon such as the Empress Eufemia, Justinian's relative a commander of the Court Guard Vitalian, maids of honour: Anastasia, Palmacja Julianan Anicia, Celer, Pompeius, German were successful in making an ecumenical effort to restore the union in the Catholic Church.


2021 ◽  
pp. 122-143
Author(s):  
Nicole Archambeau

This chapter considers the sacrament of penance as one of the most dangerous moments Countess Delphine’s witnesses have ever faced. It describes the testimonies of several witnesses that indicated that the sacrament was a moment they believed things could go terribly wrong. It also notes the changes in the sacrament of penance in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, which showed extremes presented in the writings of reformers of the Catholic Church. The chapter discusses how the witnesses’ experiences reveal the stresses of the sacrament of penance on pious people who had access to trained confessors or might even be confessors themselves. It elaborates how their testimonies show that it was difficult for them to understand the proliferation of sins and the role of penitential acts in forgiveness.


2001 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 139-162 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gérard Prunier

AbstractThis paper examines the role of the Catholic Church in the armed conflict that has engulfed the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) since 1993. The conflict itself has two dimensions. Since 1996 the DRC has been at the centre of a major war that has spilled well beyond its borders, embroiling neighbouring states and others further afield. Less well known is the local struggle, in the eastern part of the country in the two provinces of North and South Kivu, which began three years earlier. While having a dynamic of its own, Kivu's fate has become entwined in the wider international conflict. Given its large constituency and immense wealth and infrastructure, the Catholic Church has come to wield enormous influence in the DRC, particularly in the context of a declining state. It was a key player in the movement for democratisation in the early 1990s and more recently it has sought to offer moral guidance on the conflict. But its attempts to adopt a superior moral outlook have been severely tested by the fact that its clergy are now thoroughly zairianised, and have come to embody the ethnic and political prejudices of their respective communities.


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