The Church and the Totalitarian Systems, 1939–1989 : Global Catholicism and the Polish Experience

This volume presents the history of relations between the Catholic Church and the twentieth-century totalitarian governments (the Soviet Union, Hitler’s Germany, Fascist Italy, Franco’s Spain and Salazar’s Portugal), focusing on Central Europe and Poland in particular.

This volume presents the history of relations between the Catholic Church and the twentieth-century totalitarian governments (the Soviet Union, Hitler’s Germany, Fascist Italy, Franco’s Spain and Salazar’s Portugal), focusing on Central Europe and Poland in particular. The text describes both opposition and cooperation of Catholics with Fascism, Nazism and Communism, trying to answer an essential question whether being a Catholic determined people’s attitude toward totalitarian evil, while the background for the narrative is the history of Poland. However, the book also describes the Church’s relations with totalitarianisms not only in Poland but also in other countries behind the Iron Curtain (East-Central Europe and the Balkans). It also includes the history of those states that are not part of the regions mentioned, but that fell under control of totalitarian regimes. The Church and the Totalitarian Systems, 1939–1989 will be beneficial for postgraduates, researchers and academics of history, sociology, philosophy and ethics.