Korespondencja arcybiskupa ormiańskokatolickiego Józefa Teodorowicza z prymasem Polski kardynałem Augustem Hlondem z lat 1924-1938

The Correspondence between the Armenian Catholic Archbishop Józef Teodorowicz and the Polish Primate Cardinal August Hlond in the years 1924-1938 Cardinal August Hlond (1881-1948) and Archbishop Józef Teodorowicz (1864-1938) are notable representatives of the Polish Episcopate of the first half of the 20th century. They were men of extraordinary abilities, spiritual and intellectual values and organizational skills. As devout shepherds and great patriots, they took an active part in public life. Their letters, which constitute the main subject of this edit, illustrate the comprehensive and multi-layered involvement of both hierarchs in the area of Church and state, as well as their intense mutual cooperation. The article raises a number of issues, mainly concerning the problems of the Catholic Church in Poland at that time, i.e. the establishment of the Catholic News Agency, the work to create the facilities of the Catholic Action and their activities, the Catholic press in Poland, religious ceremonies, the education reform, catechisation, religious congregations, and the work of the episcopacy: the agenda, pastoral letters, activities of individual committees, etc. In addition, the letters provide information on the position of the two hierarchs on the parliamentary elections and the political situation in Poland, and also on the dispute between Archbishop Teodorowicz and the Jesuit Paweł Siwek about the Catholic mystic Therese Neumann of Konnersreuth.

Postsäkulares Placemaking im oberpfälzischen Konnersreuth: Sakralisierung, Kulturerbe, Eigensinn

The initiation of the beatification process of catholic stigmatist Therese Neumann of Konnersreuth/Bavaria (1898–1962) in February 2005 marks the beginning of the touristic marketing of her birth place in the context of EU-regionalization. In the case concerned, I argue, the Postsecular emerges in the evolution of new forms of EU-regional governance and in the controversial valorisation of a catholic popular cult as cultural heritage. I examine postsecular placemaking in Konnersreuth as a process, in which actors of the local civil society, the official church and the EU bureaucracy stage Therese Neumann by the valorisation of her material heritage, by sacralization and profanation. In doing this, actors renegotiate boundaries and transitions between the religious and the secular sphere, as well as between the regional, the global and the singular universality of grace. In their productions of space, local actors mediate between tourist and spiritual experiences of authenticity, between the popular demand for heritage and the awaiting for the religious event of grace. The postsecular, I argue, emerges in the insistence of parts of the local civil society to authorize the deceased Therese Neumann herself as an – though unwilling – supranatural actor in the placemaking process and in their legitimation of their own (un-)willingness to participate in the sacralization and touristification of their heritage with the will of the stigmatist. The article shows, how religious belief can play the role of a ressource as well as a disruptive factor in postsecular placemaking processes and neoliberal governing by community.