Academic literature on the topic 'Prisoners – Religious life – Germany'

With the invasion of Poland on September 1, 1939, National Socialist Germany aimed to destroy the Polish nation and Polish national consciousness. The Nazi regime attempted to accomplish this in a variety of ways, including the destruction of Polish cultural institutions, forced resettlement, forced labor, incarceration in prisons and camps, random and systematic roundups of prisoners, and mass murder. To the German authorities in occupied Poland and to many Poles, it was obvious that the occupation would target the Polish Catholic Church with vigor and brutality. Catholicism was the religion of approximately 65 percent of interwar Poland's population: it dominated religious life, held tremendous wealth and political power, and its clergy were widely respected as members of the intelligentsia. More importantly for the Germans, the Catholic Church was a locus and symbol of Polish national identity.

Clothes make the man. This is especially true for those who are outside the norm, such as prisoners. In her study of prison violence, Bereswill emphasizes that the misappropriation of clothing through threats is part of everyday prison life. On the one hand, this strengthens the position in the prisoner hierarchy. On the other hand, the need for new clothes is also satisfied. A discussion of prisoner clothing, if one wants to disregard the concentration camp prisoner clothing, has so far only been rudimentary. The reason for this seems to be that a more extensive study of clothing does not represent a worthwhile research object due to “its everyday banality”. There are empirical, contemporary-oriented works on clothing in prison from a cultural and legal perspective. They dealt with the functions and meanings of clothing and fashion in women's prisons. Ash's study of the development of prison clothing from a historical perspective with contextual references to legal, social and, in particular, fashion history refers to the Anglo-American world. In her analysis of striped concentration camp clothing, Schmidt provides some information on the history and development of prisoner clothing in German prisons in the 19th and 20th centuries. Due to their respective focus of interest, the studies by Ash and Schmidt lack a more detailed reference to the penal system, which Einsiedler emphasizes very clearly. The following investigation approaches prisoner clothing in the context of their design and functionality, which has so far received little attention. The central thesis is that prisoner clothing serves the purpose of prison-specific rationalization and enforcement of prison discipline in the sense of the concepts of Foucault and Goffman. The focus is on the following questions: What was the prisoner’s clothing made of and what did it look like? Which “general” functions did it fulfill and which further functions did it fulfill in the context of the prison? What were the implications of this for the prisoners? Were these subject to change?

Abstract The struggle to resist dehumanization and maintain a sense of identity and dignity in the German concentration camps has been a key theme in survivor testimonies. Some prisoners assert the paramount importance of religious faith in mustering the inner strength needed to survive. However, the clandestine nature of religious practice in the camps has meant that memoirs provide only fragmentary glimpses of these practices and their significance in the camps. This article seeks to reconstruct a fuller picture of the religious life of Catholic Poles at the Gusen Concentration Camp in Upper Austria from 1940 to 1945. In particular, the article focuses on the activities of a living rosary group organized by Wacław Milke and Władysław Gębik. This group was unusual in the breadth of its activities and its extensive network of contacts. Not only did it organize religious devotions, but it also provided life-saving practical assistance to other prisoners.

Insufficiently known pages from the history of Plast are considered in the article. They concern to the revival of the organization in the camps for prisoners of war – DPs – in Germany after World War II and the beginning of the organization activities in Australia. It is concluded that the formation of the first Plast circles during this period has been spontaneous and taken place within the framework of active social, political, cultural, religious and economic life of Ukrainians in the DP camps. The Union of Ukrainian Plast Emigrants (UUPE) leаded by commandant Atanas Figol has been revived to direct this process to organized course. During 1945–1948 he has conducted a number of meetings important for the further development of Plast. Organizational and ideological principles of its activities analyzed in the submitted research are formed at them. It is proved that the Congress in Aschaffenburg of 1948 has become the milestone event for Plast. It has taken place as a part of celebration of the 35th anniversary of the organization creation. Taking into account the beginning of the relocation of many Ukrainians to the places of the new settlement, the Congress has been held under the slogan On a Long Journey to a Great Goal. It is found out that the main threats awaiting Ukrainians abroad in the understanding of the Plast leaders of this period are described. Attention is also paid to moral, spiritual and ideological heritage that Plast members should take in this journey; the requirements for physical development and national-patriotic education; the ideal of a young Ukrainian; ways of preservation of national and cultural space, etc. These guidelines have formed the basis for the development of Plast activities in Australia, where the first wave of Ukrainian emigrants arrive in 1948–1951. The main ways of their implementation, as well as the challenges faced by Ukrainians on the new continent territory are revealed. The names of the first Plast members in Australia, data on their number, location of circles, artistic groups in which they participate, are introduces into scientific circulation in the research.

The reviewed work is devoted to a significant, and yet little-studied in both national and foreign scholarship, issue of the clergy interactions with German occupational authorities on the territory of the USSR in the days of the Great Patriotic War. It introduces into scientific use historically significant complex of documents (1941-1945) from the archive of the Office of the Metropolitan Sergius (Voskresensky) of Vilnius and Lithuania, patriarchal exarch in Latvia and Estonia, and also records from the investigatory records on charges against clergy and employees concerned in the activities of the Pskov Orthodox Mission (1944-1990). Documents included in the publication are stored in the archives of Moscow, St. Petersburg, Estonia, Lithuania, Leningrad, Novgorod, and Pskov regions. They allow some insight into nature, forms, and methods of the Nazi occupational regime policies in the conquered territories (including policies towards the Church). The documents capture religious policies of the Nazis and inner life of the exarchate, describe actual situation of population and clergy, management activities and counterinsurgency on the occupied territories. The documents bring to light connections between the exarchate and German counterintelligence and reveal the nature of political police work with informants. They capture the political mood of population and prisoners of war. There is information on participants of partisan movement and underground resistance, on communication net between the patriarchal exarchate in the Baltic states and the German counterintelligence. Reports and dispatches of the clergy in the pay of the Nazis addressed to the Metropolitan Sergius (Voskresensky) contain detailed activity reports. Investigatory records contain important biographical information and personal data on the collaborators. Most of the documents, being classified, have never been published before.

The article attempts to reconstruct the course of cultural, educational and national-organisational work in the Wetzlar camp (Germany) in 1916 by frontal elaboration of the annual set of the camp journal «Prosvitnyi Lystok». It was established that his columns contained a huge amount of information about the life and everyday life of Ukrainian prisoners in Wetzlar, which allows a fairly complete reconstruction of the features of organizational and educational work in this camp. In almost every issue of the newspaper there was a column “From Camp Life”, which contained brief information about the activities of all camp groups and organizations, as well as elected bodies of the Ukrainian community. In addition, all donations received were also reported here (for the disabled and sick in the camp hospital, for Volyn schools, etc.). Acquaintance with the camp chronicle allows to determine the circle of donors, which were profitable organizations in the camp (cooperative union, theatre, “artisan workshop”). With its publications, the newspaper had a strong influence on the formation of the national and political worldview of prisoners, publishing materials on the course of socio-political processes in Ukraine and Russia. At the same time, «Prosvitnyi Lystok» effectively expanded the knowledge of prisoners in agronomy with its articles. At the same time, the magazine instilled in the prisoners the basic principles of civic life, emphasizing the injustice of the imperial order in Russia and the enslaved status of Ukraine as part of the empire. Thanks to this, the magazine gained the support of the majority of Ukrainian prisoners, serving them as almost the only “window” into the world of politics, public life and art. Besides, it successfully fulfilled the mission of an information link between the camp organization and the work teams, providing their members with news and socially significant information. The most important feature of the “Enlightenment Leaf” was the Ukrainian-centricity of all its materials, which helped the prisoners to learn the national-state ideals.

Management of religious guidance in shaping the character of prisoners is a renewal, refinement or effort of action or activity carried out in an integrated, efficient and effective manner to obtain better results. If this guidance activity is carried out on prisoners, then religious guidance will give meaning to the prisoner to be faithful, knowledgeable and have a noble character in life and life. The process of forming good characters must be in accordance with the basis for the formation of good characters itself, namely the Al-Qur'an and the life and life examples of the Prophet Muhammad SAW. Al-Qur'an is the Word of Allah SWT in which it provides guidance for humans in various aspects, one of which is about guidelines for behavior so that humans can distinguish between good and bad.

The article presents issues related to penitentiary social resocialization, taking into account the social rehabilitation dimension of prisoners' religiosity. Based on the results of previous research on this subject area and the literature on the subject, a thorough analysis of religiosity as a factor determining the effectiveness of social resocialization of offenders was carried out. Analyzing social resocialization as a process of internal transformation of a socially maladjusted person in the context of religious commitment, it was indicated that the process of penitentiary social rehabilitation taking into account the religious dimension of offenders may have a significant impact on changing the current anti-social behavior. Based on the analysis, it was also shown that focusing on religious life helps prisoners to change their current lives and makes it easier for them to start a new life path and protects them from returning to crime. The subject matter is an important topic from the point of view of social resocialization and moral renewal of a socially maladjusted man, which has not yet been subjected to a broader scientific analysis in the field of social sciences.

The focus of research, pertaining to the practice of Islam in prisons, has been primarily on Western countries (the US, the UK, and France) where Muslim inmates struggle with discrimination and stigmatization as “religious radicals” or “terrorists”. Far less is known about the relationship Muslim prisoners have with their faith in countries where Islam is the official religion and imposed by the State, such as the Islamic Republic of Iran. Understanding the influence of political, legal, and religious institutions is crucial to exploring Islam in Iranian prisons, as well as the role of other less prominent determining factors. This qualitative study examines the practice and perception of Islam in Iranian prisons. Data were collected through 90 in-depth, semi-structured interviews with prisoners and former prisoners, and analyzed using grounded theory. Results show that practicing Islam rituals and converting from a “sinner” to a “believer” was pervasive among inmates on death row and incarcerated mothers who left their children for a life of confinement. Practicing Islamic rituals, which entail the achievement of privileges, especially memorizing the holy Quran or attending congregational prayers, question the authenticity of faith and religious beliefs in prison; prisoners disparage those who practice rituals as “fake believers” who are merely seeking preferential treatment. While practicing Islam rituals provoked hatred and humor among prisoners, attending the Ashura mourning ceremony and performing self-flagellation are respected and admired practices. Iranian prisoners create a subculture where Islam is not pivotal to constructing or reconstructing their identities, yet religious-based rehabilitation still exists.

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Bachelors
Arts and Sciences
Psychology

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A questão penitenciária é amplamente discutida na sociedade atual, seja por aspectos relacionados à segurança pública, pela (in)eficiência do sistema penitenciário na recuperação de apenados ou por suas condições estruturais. A realidade brasileira nos mostra um universo prisional deficitário e carente de políticas que efetivem a garantia dos direitos dos detentos. Nesse contexto, atividades religiosas têm assegurado espaço nos presídios, que são vistos como um campo fértil de atuação. Acredita-se que o discurso religioso seja o discurso com o qual o detento mais tenha contato e que dentre os tipos de assistência, a religiosa seja a que mais se cumpra na prisão. O objetivo desse trabalho foi investigar os significados da vida prisional e religiosa entre internos de um presídio e voluntários que realizam a assistência religiosa na instituição. A pesquisa foi organizada em duas etapas e desenvolvida no Instituto de Readaptação Social (IRS), Vila Velha, Espírito Santo. Em um primeiro momento, que durou cerca de dois meses, foi realizada a observação das práticas religiosas na unidade. Após esse período foram entrevistados individualmente, com auxílio de um de roteiro semiestruturado, seis agentes religiosos e 11 internos do IRS. Todas as entrevistas foram gravadas em áudio mediante autorização dos participantes, que assinaram um termo de consentimento livre e esclarecido, e posteriormente foram transcritas integralmente, para serem submetidas à análise por meio do software Alceste. Utilizou-se também o recurso de diário de campo, onde foram registrados todos os dias de visita a unidade prisional. Pressupostos teóricos de Michel Foucault e Erving Goffman orientaram as discussões desta pesquisa. No estudo realizado com os voluntários religiosos, foi possível perceber singularidades entre as práticas dos diferentes grupos religiosos. A assistência religiosa prestada pelos grupos católico e espírita apresenta semelhanças e parece mais voltada ao coletivo carcerário, sendo a religiosidade menos enfatizada, embora seja um aspecto presente. Católicos e espíritas entendem que a assistência religiosa tem o objetivo de garantir melhores condições de vida aos detentos, pela busca do respeito aos seus direitos. A ressocialização é um objetivo presente, mas é vista a partir da transformação das condições de vida na prisão. O principal objetivo da assistência religiosa evangélica é a conversão, portanto o foco das atividades é no indivíduo e na sua transformação pessoal. A ressocialização, entre os evangélicos, é vista como uma transformação íntima na vida do detento por meio da assimilação de uma doutrina religiosa. No estudo realizado com os internos do presídio foi possível observar algumas estratégias de vida que os detentos criam para viver na prisão. Embora o universo prisional possa ser considerado um espaço de mortificação, os internos não se entregam a esse processo de despotencialização da vida. Na busca de alternativas possíveis para lidar com o encarceramento, criam modos de vida que rompem com essa ideia de sujeição ao sistema penitenciário. O tempo de prisão pode estar associado a determinadas formas de lidar com o encarceramento. As análises indicaram que quanto maior o período de prisão, mais intenso parece ser o processo de mortificação do eu. O encontro com o mundo religioso na prisão também é uma via possível para lidar com o encarceramento. A religiosidade permite aos internos significar as suas vidas, além de ser um recurso para enfrentar situações adversas na prisão. Por meio dessa vivência os detentos parecem sentir certa autonomia, embora estejam submetidos a um regime de controle. As práticas religiosas funcionam, dessa maneira, como ajustamentos secundários, que permitem aos detentos certo conforto psíquico, uma satisfação que seria difícil de ser atingida por outros meios, nas circunstâncias em que eles se encontram. Enfatiza-se a importância de se construir na prisão espaços que não tenham efeitos mortificadores, mas que potencializem os modos de vida. É fundamental que o detento tenha a possibilidade de cumprir sua pena em melhores condições e de compreender a sua vida por distintas vias discursivas. Transformar o sistema penal é urgente, para que o universo penitenciário não seja um mecanismo de aplicação de práticas punitivas, coercitivas e moralistas. É preciso romper com a visão do presídio como uma instituição custodial
The penitentiary issue is broadly discussed in today s society for the aspects related to public security, the (in)efficiency of the system in recuperating the prisoners, or because of its structural conditions. The Brazilian reality shows us a deficient prison universe which lacks policies that can provide prisoners rights. In such context, religious activities have secured some space inside the penitentiaries, which are seen as a fertile ground for their actuation. It is believed that the religious speech is the one with which the prisoner has more contact and, among the various types of assistance, it is the most effective in prisons. The objective of this study was to investigate the meaning of prison and religious life for the interns of a prison and the voluntaries who give religious assistance inside the institution. The research was done in two steps and performed at Instituto de Reablitação Social (IRS), in Vila Velha, Espirito Santo. At the first moment, which lasted about two months, the religious practice inside the institution was observed. After this period, six religious agents and 11 inmates were interviewed with the help of a semi-structured script. All the interviews were recorded with the authorization of the subjects, who signed a clear term of agreement. Later, they were thoroughly transcribed in order to be analyzed by Alceste software. A journal was also used and every day of visitation was registered. Theories by Michel Foucault and Erving Goffman guided the discussions in this work. In the study with the religious group, it was possible to notice singularities between the practices of different groups. The religious assistance given by Catholics and Spiritists present similarities and seem to care more about the prison collective than about religion, although this element is present. Catholics and Spiritists understand that religious assistance has the objective of guarantying better conditions of life for the detents, and respect for their rights. Resocialization is a goal, but it is seen from the perspective of changing life conditions in prison. The main objective of the Evangelical assistance is conversion, so the focus of activities in on the individual and their personal transformation. Resocialization, for the Evangelicals, is seen as an intimate transformation in the life of the inmate by the assimilation of a religious doctrine. In the study done with the prisoners, it was possible to notice some strategies that they create to live inside the prisons. Although the prison universe is considered a space for mortification, the incarcerated do not give in to such process of depotentiation of life. In the search for possible alternatives to deal with imprisonment, they find ways of living that refuse this idea of submission to the prison system. The time of sentence may be associated with certain ways to deal with imprisonment. The analysis indicates that the longer the period, the more intense seems the process of mortification of the self. The meeting with the religious world inside the prison is also a viable way to endure sentence time. Religiosity allows the interns to find meaning for their lives, besides being a resource to help facing adverse situations in prison. Such way of living seems to give the detents some autonomy, although submitted to control. Religious practices work, this way, as secondary adjustments that give the inmates some kind of psychological comfort; a satisfaction that would be hard to find due to the circumstances they are experiencing. It is necessary to emphasize the need to build, inside the prisons, spaces that do not impose mortification; spaces that promote vitalization. It is fundamental that the prisoner have the possibility of serving his sentence in better conditions and understanding their life through distinct discursive ways. The transformation of the prison system is an urgent need so that the prison universe does not become a mechanism for punitive, coercive, and moralist practices. It is necessary to stop seeing the prison as a custodial institution

Early modern Lutherans, as is well known, worshipped in decorated churches. They adopted a path of reform that neither disposed of all ornament nor retained all the material trappings of the Catholic church. This thesis studies the fortunes of ecclesiastical art in the Duchy of Württemberg after its Reformation in 1534 and the place images found for themselves in the devotional lives of Lutherans up to c. 1700. The territory was shaped not just by Lutheranism, but initially by Zwinglianism too. The early years of reform thus saw moments of iconoclasm. The Zwinglian influence was responsible for a simple liturgy that distinguished Württemberg Lutheranism from its confessional allies in the north. This study considers the variety of uses to which Lutheran art was put in this context. It addresses the different ways in which Lutherans used the visual setting of the church to define their relationships with their God, their church, and each other. The Dukes of Württemberg used their stance on images to communicate their political and confessional allegiances; pastors used images to define the parameters of worship and of the church space itself; parishioners used images, funerary monuments, and church adornment to express their Lutheran identity and establish their position within social hierarchies. As Lutheranism developed in the seventeenth century, so too did Lutheran art, becoming more suited to fostering contemplative devotion. While diverse in their aims, many Lutherans appreciated the importance of regular investment in the visual. Ducal pronouncements, archives held centrally and locally, surviving artefacts and decoration in churches, and printed sources enable the distinctive visual character of Lutheranism in Württemberg to be identified here.

Defence date: 4 March 2006
Examining board: Peter Wagner (supervisor, European University Institute, Florence, I) ; James A. Beckford (co-supervisor, University of Warwick, Coventry, UK) ; Gianfranco Poggi (Università degli Studi di Trento, I) ; Emilio Santoro (Università degli Studi di Firenze, I)
PDF of thesis uploaded from the Library digitised archive of EUI PhD theses completed between 2013 and 2017

In this research study, the correlation between culture and gospel is investigated by examining changes in the interpretation of the cross of Christ from Early Christianity up to present times, using the method of paradigmatic analysis designed by David J. Bosch. Following the concept of the Missio Dei within mission theology, this study aims to find a perspective on the event of the cross which is relevant for today's practice. With reference to the topics of cultural context, sin, sacrifice, vicariousness, cross and mission, this study shows that in every paradigm the diverse perspectives of the interpretation of Jesus' death were explicable and helpful within their relevant contexts. It can also be seen that in its objectives, message and practice, mission correlates with the respective motifs prevalent at the time. In conclusion, after determining the proper place of the results within the concept of Missio Dei in mission theology, the study examines the relevance of these results for the Missio Christi, in order to offer a contribution to the debate and a potential perspective for explaining the significance of Jesus' death in the current German-speaking cultural context.
Christian Spirituality, Church History & Missiology
M. Th. (Missiology)

AbstractBetween 1933 and 1945, almost 300,000 people were murdered and 360,000 sterilized by the National Socialist (Nazi) regime under a group of crimes now collectively known as the Krankenmorde, the murder of the sick and disabled. Founded in narrow-minded and inconsistent accounts of a good and valuable life, the Nazi eugenic and “euthanasia” crimes were brutal and violent acts organized and executed by doctors, nurses and other professionals. Acknowledgement of this group of victims was delayed and obscured due to historical events as well as prevailing political and social attitudes toward mental illness and disability. As a result, the breadth of the Krankemorde crimes and its victims, its relationship to the Holocaust and its contemporary significance–to bioethics and society more broadly–is less recognized or understood than that of other Nazi medical crimes, such as the infamous experiments on prisoners. First presenting a history of the Krankenmorde and its aftermath in Germany and Nazi occupied territories, this chapter goes on to examine the value of bioethics having better knowledge of this part of its history and, in particular, engaging with its own epistemic constraints in relation to disability and ableism. These ideas are explored further in the context of contemporary bioethical issues related to the rights and treatment of people with disabilities, specifically the allocation of health resources. Throughout the chapter we seek to highlight the lives of Krankenmorde victims–those who survived and those who did not–all of whom have been historically overlooked and marginalized.

AbstractReligion, religiosity and spirituality are gaining importance for social work in Germany as a discipline and as a profession, especially in the context of Muslim people seeking advice. Most Muslims regard Islam as a social religion which helps in different life situations. For them, the central elements of their belief, such as mercy, charity, solidarity and assisting each other, are core elements of help in society. The purpose of this chapter is to show the importance of the real life experiences of people who seek advice in social work. In this context, the chapter shows that counselling is subject-, task- and context-related. Counselling deals with life realities and can address and solve specific problems, support individuals in making decisions and coping effectively with crises. At the least, a sensitive attitude towards religious questions provides an ability to deal constructively with the reality of life. Within this perspective, the practice model, the Meeting and Further Training Centre for Muslim Women, shows how it is possible to gain access to welfare issues in the context of religion and social work.

AbstractIn general, historians of science and historians of ideas do not focus on critical appraisals of scientific ideas such as vitalism and materialism from Catholic intellectuals in eastern and southeastern Europe, nor is there much comparative work available on how significant European ideas in the life sciences such as materialism and vitalism were understood and received outside of France, Germany, Italy and the UK. Insofar as such treatments are available, they focus on the contributions of nineteenth century vitalism and materialism to later twentieth ideologies, as well as trace the interactions of vitalism and various intersections with the development of genetics and evolutionary biology see Mosse (The culture of Western Europe: the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Westview Press, Boulder, 1988, Toward the final solution: a history of European racism. Howard Fertig Publisher, New York, 1978; Turda et al., Crafting humans: from genesis to eugenics and beyond. V&R Unipress, Goettingen, 2013). English and American eugenicists (such as William Caleb Saleeby), and scores of others underscored the importance of vitalism to the future science of “eugenics” (Saleeby, The progress of eugenics. Cassell, New York, 1914). Little has been written on materialism qua materialism or vitalism qua vitalism in eastern Europe.The Czech and Slovene cases are interesting for comparison insofar as both had national awakenings in the middle of the nineteenth century which were linguistic and scientific, while also being religious in nature (on the Czech case see David, Realism, tolerance, and liberalism in the Czech National awakening: legacies of the Bohemian reformation. Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 2010; on the Slovene case see Kann and David, Peoples of the Eastern Habsburg Lands, 1526-1918. University of Washington Press, Washington, 2010). In the case of many Catholic writers writing in Moravia, there are not only slight noticeable differences in word-choice and construction but a greater influence of scholastic Latin, all the more so in the works of nineteenth century Czech priests and bishops.In this case, German, Latin and literary Czech coexisted in the same texts. Thus, the presence of these three languages throws caution on the work on the work of Michael Gordin, who argues that scientific language went from Latin to German to vernacular. In Czech, Slovenian and Croatian cases, all three coexisted quite happily until the First World War, with the decades from the 1840s to the 1880s being particularly suited to linguistic flexibility, where oftentimes writers would put in parentheses a Latin or German word to make the meaning clear to the audience. Note however that these multiple paraphrases were often polemical in the case of discussions of materialism and vitalism.In Slovenia Čas (Time or The Times) ran from 1907 to 1942, running under the muscular editorship of Fr. Aleš Ušeničnik (1868–1952) devoted hundreds of pages often penned by Ušeničnik himself or his close collaborators to wide-ranging discussions of vitalism, materialism and its implied social and societal consequences. Like their Czech counterparts Fr. Matěj Procházka (1811–1889) and Fr. Antonín LenzMaterialismMechanismDynamism (1829–1901), materialism was often conjoined with "pantheism" and immorality. In both the Czech and the Slovene cases, materialism was viewed as a deep theological problem, as it made the Catholic account of the transformation of the Eucharistic sacrifice into the real presence untenable. In the Czech case, materialism was often conjoined with “bestiality” (bestialnost) and radical politics, especially agrarianism, while in the case of Ušeničnik and Slovene writers, materialism was conjoined with “parliamentarianism” and “democracy.” There is too an unexamined dialogue on vitalism, materialism and pan-Slavism which needs to be explored.Writing in 1914 in a review of O bistvu življenja (Concerning the essence of life) by the controversial Croatian biologist Boris Zarnik) Ušeničnik underscored that vitalism was an speculative outlook because it left the field of positive science and entered the speculative realm of philosophy. Ušeničnik writes that it was “Too bad” that Zarnik “tackles” the question of vitalism, as his zoological opinions are interesting but his philosophy was not “successful”. Ušeničnik concluded that vitalism was a rather old idea, which belonged more to the realm of philosophy and Thomistic theology then biology. It nonetheless seemed to provide a solution for the particular characteristics of life, especially its individuality. It was certainly preferable to all the dangers that materialism presented. Likewise in the Czech case, Emmanuel Radl (1873–1942) spent much of his life extolling the virtues of vitalism, up until his death in home confinement during the Nazi Protectorate. Vitalism too became bound up in the late nineteenth century rediscovery of early modern philosophy, which became an essential part of the development of new scientific consciousness and linguistic awareness right before the First World War in the Czech lands. Thus, by comparing the reception of these ideas together in two countries separated by ‘nationality’ but bounded by religion and active engagement with French and German ideas (especially Driesch), we can reconstruct not only receptions of vitalism and materialism, but articulate their political and theological valances.

The article considers the history, thematic range of expression and a number of authors and publicists of the newspaper «Christian Voice» (with the frequency of a fortnightly). It has been published in Munich by nationally conscious groups of migrants since 1949 as a part of the «Ukrainian Christian Publishing House». The significance of this Ukrainian newspaper in post-Nazi Germany is only partly comprehended in the works of a number of diaspora press’s researchers. Therefore, the purpose of this article is to supplement the scientific information about the «Christian Voice» in the postwar period, in particular, the yearbook for 1957 was chosen as the principal subject of analysis. In the process of writing the article, we used such methods: analysis, synthesis, content analysis, generalization and others. Thus, the results of our study became the socio-political and religious context in which the «Christian Voice» was founded. The article is also a concise overview of the titles of Ukrainian magazines in post-Nazi Germany in the 1940s and 1950s. The thematic analysis of publications of 1957 showed the main trends of journalistic texts in the newspaper and the journalistic skills of it’s iconic authors and publicists (D. Buchynsky, M. Bradovych, S. Shah, etc.). The thematic range of the newspaper after 1959 was somewhat narrowed due to the change in the status of the «Christian Voice» when it became the official newspaper of the UGCC in Germany. It has been distinguished two main thematic blocks of the newspaper ‒ social and religious. Historians will find interesting factual material from the newspaper publications about the life of Ukrainians in the diaspora. Historians of journalism can supplement the bibliographic apparatus in the journalistic and publicistic works of the authors in the postwar period of the newspaper and in subsequent years of publishing. Based upon the publications of the «Christian Voice» in different years, not only since 1957, journalists can study the contents and a form of different genres, linguistic peculiarities in the newspaper articles, and so on.