Polish Teachers' Association in the Lublin Area in Conflict With the Authorities and the Church in The 1930's.

Abstract

The article is concerned with the interesting problem connected with the social relations in Poland in the years 1918-1939, and that is the question of the ideological image of the Polish intelligentsia of that epoch. Polish teachers of that time may be considered the nation's intellectual elite. The teachers' main trade union, the Polish Teachers' Association, came into various conflicts with the Church hierarchy. This resulted to a large degree from the positivist (scientistic) formation of the then elite. Scientism, defined as having a peculiar “faith in the science”, in the opinion of many people did not agree with the “fideist” attitude. The peak of that conflict fell on 1937, when the Board of Directors of the Association was suspended by the state authorities as it was suspected of Communist influences.

However, the research conducted by the author shows that the greater part of the PTA activists were not willing to accept the Communist ideology; on the contrary, they assumed a hostile attitude towards it. On the other hand, the anticlerical position they took in many cases was connected with leftist social views and with the already mentioned positivist intellectual formation. Another important thesis the author of the article tries to prove is the fact of the intelligentsia's gradual departure from the antireligious, scientistic attitude (especially in the 1930's), and ever more frequent submission to the Church's pastoral influences.