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Document Details : Title: Een Vaticaans complot? Subtitle: Internationalisme, katholicisme en de zoektocht naar Europese eenwording, 1945-4950 Author(s): VAN DEN BOS, Maarten Journal: Tijdschrift voor Theologie Volume: 58 Issue: 3 Date: 2018 Pages: 259-279 DOI: 10.2143/TVT.58.3.3285190 Abstract : In Catholic communities in Western Europe, during and immediately following the Second World War, a broad discussion was conducted on peace and community. Intellectuals, clerics and politicians formed an important network, the members of which discussed the role of religious doctrines and Catholic social teachings in the building of a peaceful post-war world. Within a broad range of magazines and movements, they conceptualised an international Catholic community as a moral community of likeminded and equal individuals. They combined a principal openness towards non-Catholics with the feeling that both religious life and church politics were in urgent need of renewal. At the same time, the Holy See developed ideas on an international Catholic community in a more traditional sense, by emphasising traditional family values, a strong anti-pluralism and communitarian conception of society in which social harmony was best served by everyone knowing their place. The ideas of both groups were important, forming as they did the intellectual context for politicians working at the origin of Europe’s political and economic integration. Following the work of especially Kiran Klaus Patel, these narratives of Europe as a spiritual or moral community should be more fully integrated into the history of early European integration as should narratives on the rebuilding of Europe be integrated more in post-war religious history. This article aims to show the benefits of adopting a transnational approach in order to understand the importance of intellectual debates on community, religious renewal and political ideas about internationalism and European cooperation. |
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