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Document Details : Title: International Relations Subtitle: The Papacy and the Second Polish Republic in Relation to the Eastern Question: A Case Study Author(s): WALCZAK, Wojciech Journal: Orientalia Christiana Periodica Volume: 91 Issue: 2 Date: 2025 Pages: 477-488 DOI: 10.2143/OCP.91.2.3295416 Abstract : The article examines the policies of the Second Polish Republic and the Holy See toward the Neo-Uniate Church in the context of the so-called Eastern Question during the interwar period. Employing a historical-comparative approach, it analyzes how geopolitical instability, nationality policy, and confessional competition shaped the emergence and limited development of Neo-Uniate structures in the Eastern Borderlands. The study demonstrates that both the Polish state and the Vatican viewed the Neo-Uniate Church instrumentally: Warsaw as a potential tool of Polonization and territorial integration, and the Holy See as a means of counterbalancing Orthodoxy and reclaiming influence in former Uniate territories. However, tensions between church and state, resistance from the Roman Catholic hierarchy, and local distrust among Belarusian and Ukrainian populations hindered broader institutional consolidation. The article further situates these dynamics within the wider geopolitical landscape of the Versailles order, highlighting how Poland’s precarious security environment and its policy of balancing between Germany and the USSR limited coherent long-term engagement with the Neo-Uniate project. Ultimately, it argues that the Neo-Uniate Church remained marginal in shaping regional policy or national integration, though it retained its confessional identity. The study also notes the scarcity of sources, the need for localized case studies, and the importance of integrating social-reception analysis and oral history into future research on the interwar borderlands. |
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