Vovk Y. The policy of the Polish State towards Christian confessions in 1918-1926

In the thesis is researched in complex the policy of Rech Pospolita Second towards Christian confessions and in the context of renovation its statehood in 1918-1926. The society of Poland interwar was divided into nation and religious communities. There were main several branches out of Christianity in the Polish society: Orthodox Church, Protestant churches, Roman-Catholic, and as a direction of it there were Greece-Catholic churches. In same time within the bounds of ethnopolicy organism - the Polish state in 20-s XX cent. - were formed numerous ethnic socie-ties. Numerous re-allotment of land caused a polyethnic and polyconfessional structure of the Polish population as a result of six wars on its territory.At the moment an achievement of the Polish independence in 1918 there were lived more than 27 mln. people. Approximate one and the third (1/3) from them were a national minority. Most numerous minorities were the Jews, the Ukrainians, the Russians, the Byelorussians and the Germans. In accordancewith the national structure the Polish society divided into the Roman-catholic which were on the whole the Poles, the Greek-Catholic which were most of them the Ukrainians. The believers of Orthodox Church lived in Poland were the Ukrainians and the Russians. Poland had over of Protestants which were most of them the Germans. Thus, the characteristic of Rech Pospolita Second that the believers belonged to religious minorities in the main were not the Poles on the whole. The Roman Catholic Church as an of-ficial religion had the unquestionable priority. Confessional and national imperatives were unified very closed in Poland. Ministry of Religious Confession and Folk Education took deal with confessions' affairs in Rech Pospolita Second.The most religious confessions continued to depend on the central administration which as it hap-pened to be outside of Rech Pospolita Second. The polish politicians were afraid of such a fact that the governments of neighbouring countries could influence on the inner state policy under the pretext of in-terrupting in the confessional matters. The result was a supported by the government process of an estab-lishment of autocefaly of the Polish Orthodox Church. The Polish governments made the Protestant con-fessions which were administrated from abroad to create new administrations within the state. Up to the official adopting laws about settlement of Polish state's attitude to every separate con-fession, the religious legislation of previous governments (Russia, German, Austria) acted in the territory of Poland. Every confession acted within a separate territory, in fact, according to its own legislation. Be-sides Poland had to form the new one. So, several kinds of religious legislation coexisted. However the unification has not managed to finish during interwar period. As Catholic Church pretended to the priority in all fields of the country's life. The best variant for Catholic Church was theocratic state where there was not a place for another dominating. This idea was propagandised in Poland during twenties years in XX century.The state stayed officially as a tolerant one to the religious minority. In practice a range of na-tional, international and religious conditions and reasons made impossible the optimal choice in national and confessional politics. In the thesis there were thrown light onto strategic aims of the Polish State in the religious sphere, explored the technology of its practice realization. It was discovered the type of using of experience of the relationships between churches and states which territories pieced out renewed Poland.It was concretized the tactical ways and the methods of the state policy of Rech Pospolita Second towards various confessions and developed the trends and the circumstances of its progress.