Vatican II Behind the Iron Curtain

Vatican II Behind the Iron Curtain
Author: Piotr H. Kosicki
Publisher: CUA Press
Total Pages: 238
Release: 2016
Genre: History
ISBN: 081322912X

The goal of this volume is to begin writing Central and Eastern Europe back into the story of the Second Vatican Council, its origins, and its consequences. This volume assembles - for the first time in any language - a broad overview of the place of four different Communist-run countries - Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, and Yugoslavia - in the story of the Council. Framing these is an account of how the Cold War impacted the Council and its reception. The book engages with both English-language scholarship and the national historiographies of the countries that it examines, offering a global lens on the present state of research (covering all relevant languages) and seeking to propel that research forward. All of the chapters draw on both non-English secondary literature and original primary sources - some published, some archival.

Pressed by a Double Loyalty

Pressed by a Double Loyalty
Author: András Fejérdy
Publisher: Central European University Press
Total Pages: 449
Release: 2017-02-10
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9633862485

The Second Vatican Council is the single most influential event in the 20th century history of the Catholic Church. The book analyzes the relationship between the Council and the "Ostpolitik" of the Vatican through the history of the Hungarian presence at Vatican II. Pope John XXIII, elected in 1958, was a catalyst. The pope thought that his most urgent task was to renew contacts with the Church behind the iron curtain. Hungarian participation at the Council was also made possible by the new, pragmatic model in Hungarian church politics. After the crushing of the 1956 Revolution, churches in Hungary thought that the regime would last and were willing to compromise. Vatican II – in the perspective of Hungary – was not primarily an ecclesial event, but it remained closely joined to the negotiations between the Holy See and the Kádár regime: during the Council Hungary became the experimental laboratory of the Vatican's new eastern policy. Was it a Vatican decision or a Soviet instruction? Fejérdy suggests that it was a decision of the Holy See.

Pressed by a Double Loyalty

Pressed by a Double Loyalty
Author: András Fejérdy
Publisher: Central European University Press
Total Pages: 446
Release: 2017-02-10
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9633861438

The Second Vatican Council is the single most influential event in the 20th century history of the Catholic Church. The book analyzes the relationship between the Council and the "Ostpolitik" of the Vatican through the history of the Hungarian presence at Vatican II. Pope John XXIII, elected in 1958, was a catalyst. The pope thought that his most urgent task was to renew contacts with the Church behind the iron curtain. Hungarian participation at the Council was also made possible by the new, pragmatic model in Hungarian church politics. After the crushing of the 1956 Revolution, churches in Hungary thought that the regime would last and were willing to compromise. Vatican II – in the perspective of Hungary – was not primarily an ecclesial event, but it remained closely joined to the negotiations between the Holy See and the Kádár regime: during the Council Hungary became the experimental laboratory of the Vatican's new eastern policy. Was it a Vatican decision or a Soviet instruction? Fejérdy suggests that it was a decision of the Holy See.

A Pope and a President

A Pope and a President
Author: Paul Kengor
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 549
Release: 2023-07-18
Genre: History
ISBN: 1684516358

Even as historians credit Ronald Reagan and Pope John Paul II with hastening the end of the Cold War, they have failed to recognize the depth or significance of the bond that developed between the two leaders. Acclaimed scholar and bestselling author Paul Kengor changes that. In this fascinating book, he reveals a singular bond—which included a spiritual connection between the Catholic pope and the Protestant president—that drove the two men to confront what they knew to be the great evil of the twentieth century: Soviet communism. Reagan and John Paul II almost didn't have the opportunity to forge this relationship: just six weeks apart in the spring of 1981, they took bullets from would-be assassins. But their strikingly similar near-death experiences brought them close together—to Moscow's dismay.Based on Kengor's tireless archival digging and his unique access to Reagan insiders, A Pope and a President is full of revelations. It takes you inside private meetings between Reagan and John Paul II and into the Oval Office, the Vatican, the CIA, the Kremlin, and many points beyond. Nancy Reagan called John Paul II her husband's "closest friend"; Reagan himself told Polish visitors that the pope was his "best friend." When you read this book, you will understand why. As kindred spirits, Ronald Reagan and John Paul II united in pursuit of a supreme objective—and in doing so they changed history.

The Vatican «Ostpolitik» 1958-1978

The Vatican «Ostpolitik» 1958-1978
Author: Autori Vari
Publisher: Viella Libreria Editrice
Total Pages: 243
Release: 2017-04-06T00:00:00+02:00
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 8867288172

The appraisal of the political dialogue and negotiations with the communist regimes of East Central Europe commenced by the Holy See in the 1960s did not provoke only lively debates among contemporaries, but remains to the present day one of the most debated questions of the twentieth-century history: should it be assessed as a fixed path to which no alternative existed, or was it a flawed initiative which merely served the international legitimacy of the communist totalitarian system? This volume enriches the results of earlier historiography with new perspectives and confirmes inter alia that a black-and-white reading (often based on a one-sided use of sources) of Ostpolitik is incorrect: just as the critical assessment, which frequently places local considerations at the forefront, requires revision, the at times apologetic outlook defending the Vatican’s Eastern policy is also untenable. Only a nuanced and source-focused analysis of the ambitions of the Roman and Muscovite centers, and of local politics and Churches, as well as dialogue between the various research trends, can help us to gain a more thorough knowledge of (and make us better understand) those fixed paths upon which the Roman and local ecclesiastics of the era were forced to travel and which limited the possibility of success.

Abandoned by the Vatican

Abandoned by the Vatican
Author: Jack Doherty
Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
Total Pages: 442
Release: 2016-09-01
Genre:
ISBN: 9781537092409

ABANDONED BY THE VATICAN (An Analytical Memoir) By Jack Doherty If you love gripping intrigue and adventure and hate betrayal and hypocrisy, you'll be both rewarded and disgusted by reading Abandoned by the Vatican. Accompany the author as he crosses over the Iron Curtain, the dead man's land of mine fields, electrified fences and shooting fields. He prowls through the back alleys of Prague dodging the communist security police to meet secret priests waiting to tell the story of their years in prison and concentration camps, their interrogation and torture, hunger, hard labor, and now a life sentence as ex-convicts. In their atheistic police state the secret priests and their underground churches try to preserve basic human values and morals by their example. The 1968 Prague Spring reaction to Russian oppressive rule over its satellite countries brings a few years of limited freedom. Asked what they need? "News, information, books about our Catholic faith," they reply. On another trip behind the Iron Curtain the author meets more secret priests in dilapidated huts, state-built cold-water flats, university back rooms, cars, alleyways and crowded restaurants. He is shadowed by communist security police. When he reaches the border to leave the country, he is detained, questioned and strip searched. Months later on another trip he is refused entry behind the Iron Curtain, declared a persona non grata, and placed on Communism's black list. Regardless, the author with the help of United States military parishioners stationed in Germany establishes an information and book network that ships thousands of books to communist countries. Pope Saint John Paul II, then Cardinal of Krakow, Poland, wrote to the author to express "my thankfulness and appreciation for the great undertaking of the book project." But Pope John Paul II would not appreciate the author's condemnation of his and the Vatican's treatment of the secret priests, when Communism fails, the Cold War ends, and the secret priests can function publically. Now judged as a threat to the structure of the institutional church, they become the other innocent victims of clerical abuse at the hands of Vatican bureaucrats, the Czechoslovakian bishops, and the state-licensed priests who collaborated with communist governments. The author is singularly able through personal experience, research, and letters from secret bishops and priests to tell the true story, largely unknown in the English-language world: The facts on the valid ordination of secret bishops and priests; The existence of married and female priests; The inner workings of the underground churches defying communist security police; The bishops and priests who betrayed the Catholic church and became spies; The Vatican's worldwide spy and counterespionage network; The chilling Vatican hypocrisy in appeasing the communists; The rampant corruption in the Vatican as the Mafia and the Masons control the Vatican Bank, laundering money and counterfeiting stocks; And important for the survival of the Catholic Church: the legacy of the secret priests. Abandoned by the Vatican is an addition to the great Catholic tradition of analyzing the words and behavior of the Vatican, its popes, cardinals, and bishops in the manner of such authors as George Weigel, Carl Bernstein, Jason Berry, and Gary Wills."

Peace at All Costs

Peace at All Costs
Author: Annika Frieberg
Publisher: Berghahn Books
Total Pages: 253
Release: 2019-07-11
Genre: History
ISBN: 1789200253

Although it was characterized by simmering international tensions, the early Cold War also witnessed dramatic instances of reconciliation between states, as former antagonists rebuilt political, economic, and cultural ties in the wake of the Second World War. And such efforts were not confined to official diplomacy, as this study of postwar rapprochement between Poland and West Germany demonstrates. Drawing on a wide range of sources, Peace at All Costs follows Polish and German non-state activists who attempted to establish dialogue in the 1950s and 1960s, showing how they achieved modest successes and media attention at the cost of more nuanced approaches to their national histories and identities.

Through the Iron Curtain

Through the Iron Curtain
Author: Silvia Scatena
Publisher: V&R Unipress
Total Pages: 401
Release: 2023-12-04
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 3847016261

The history of the intertwined relationships woven by the Taizé Community amongst Christians of Eastern European countries in the second half of the last century has not yet been written. Yet it is a fundamental chapter for understanding the unique international influence of the community. The encounter with the different faces of a Christian youth beyond the Iron Curtain, who in Taizé had their first experience of a unified European space, was to become one of the main directions of the community's effort from the early 1960s. The contributions of this volume intend to throw a first light on this story, relying on a completely unpublished documentation and on the testimony of many protagonists involved in the construction of this unique continental and ecumenical network.

Christian Democracy Across the Iron Curtain

Christian Democracy Across the Iron Curtain
Author: Piotr H. Kosicki
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 485
Release: 2017-11-06
Genre: History
ISBN: 3319640879

This book is the first scholarly exploration of how Christian Democracy kept Cold War Europe’s eastern and western halves connected after the creation of the Iron Curtain in the late 1940s. Christian Democrats led the transnational effort to rebuild the continent’s western half after World War II, but this is only one small part of the story of how the Christian Democratic political family transformed Europe and defied the nascent Cold War’s bipolar division of the world. The first section uses case studies from the origins of European integration to reimagine Christian Democracy’s long-term significance for a united Europe. The second shifts the focus to East-Central Europeans, some exiled to Western Europe, some to the USA, others remaining in the Soviet Bloc as dissidents. The transnational activism they pursued helped to ensure that, Iron Curtain or no, the boundary between Europe’s west and east remained permeable, that the Cold War would not last and that Soviet attempts to divide the continent permanently would fail. The book’s final section features the testimony of three key protagonists. This book appeals to a wide range of audiences: undergraduate and graduate students, established scholars, policymakers (in Europe and the Americas) and potentially also general readerships interested in the Cold War or in the future of Europe.

Witness to Hope

Witness to Hope
Author: George Weigel
Publisher: Zondervan
Total Pages: 1228
Release: 2009-10-13
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0061758647

INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER "A remarkable book. Weigel's biography is likely to remain the standard one-volume reference on John Paul II for many years to come." — Pittsburg Post-Gazette ?“Fascinating. . . sheds light on the history of the twentieth century for everyone.” —New York Times Book Review The definitive biography of Pope John Paul II that explores how influential he was on the world stage and in some of the most historic events of the twentieth century that can still be felt today Witness to Hope is the authoritative biography of one of the singular figures—some might argue the singular figure—of our time. With unprecedented cooperation from John Paul II and the people who knew and worked with him throughout his life, George Weigel offers a groundbreaking portrait of the Pope as a man, a thinker, and a leader whose religious convictions defined a new approach to world politics—and changed the course of history. As even his critics concede, John Paul II occupied a unique place on the world stage and put down intellectual markers that no one could ignore or avoid as humanity entered a new millennium fraught with possibility and danger. The Pope was a man of prodigious energy who played a crucial, yet insufficiently explored, role in some of the most momentous events of our time, including the collapse of European communism, the quest for peace in the Middle East, and the democratic transformation of Latin America. With an updated preface, this edition of Witness to Hope explains how this “man from a far country” did all of that, and much more—and what both his accomplishments and the unfinished business of his pontificate mean for the future of the Church and the world.