The main catalyst of the narrative in The Heart of the Matter (1948) is pity and faith of the main protagonist. This thesis deals with Greene's unique conception of pity and faith. It is particularly faith and pity which represent keystones in number of Greene's novels. In The Heart of the Matter, Greene's personal and religious interests culminate. The theoretical part of the thesis provides a brief and comprehensive overview of Greene's life, his religious and political views, his unrelenting interest in human experience and at the same time, it aims to place him in the context of the 20th century. The central part of the thesis is dedicated to the detailed analysis of the novel along with the interpretation of key concepts and ideas.

EN The purpose of my thesis is to analyse the process of secularization in the post-war era in Italy. The study is focused on lower social classes. The aim of my thesis is to show the complexity of the process such as secularization; on the one hand there are statistic numbers showing the trend of falling religiosity, on the other hand we know Italians as believers in God and Italy as a country with catholic symbols appearing openly in public. To understand this ambivalence, it is necessary to distinguish church, religion and faith. As a primary source for my thesis I have chosen novels of the neorealist writers. As neorealism tries to capture predominantly the social reality and the writers show greater capability of uncovering the motivation of historical figure than any other possible sources, selecting the works of the neorealist writers proves to be more than suitable. The main methodology chosen for my thesis is typification, through which I tried to define the social stereotypes. The thesis is composed of nine chapters. Chapters one to three describe the political, economic and social situation of post-war Italy and define the social segment on which the thesis is focused. Presented is a characterization of neorealism and the authors as well as the most important theories of secularization...

Maid or companion: Austrocatolicism as a model of the Catholic state or state Catholicism? The presented work is from the field of legal history, but due to the topic, it also extends into other branches of law, especially religion law. This topic is the relationship between the state and the Catholic Church in the Habsburg Monarchy (including the period of the Austrian Empire and the Cisleithania). That is a relationship that is sometimes called the term austratolicism. The author's goal is to characterize this concept. To this goal, the religion law model of the Habsburg monarchy is first characterized, as well as the dynastic relationship of the Habsburgs to the Catholic Church and, in this context, the Ius exclusivae institute. Subsequently, the work turns into a historical interpretation of the changes in the mutual relations between the state and the church. It begins in the 18th century (with a small excursion into the deeper past), part of which is devoted to a situation where the church was ruled by an Enlightenment state called Josephineism. The author tries to understand its roots and place it in the broader context of the Enlightenment. Above all, however, he describes the methods that Josephineism applied to the Church. The interpretation continues into the 19th century, at the beginning of...

This diploma thesis deals with Catholicism in Poland and its permeation through the Polish national identity. The introductory chapter characterizes the concept of identity Polak-Katolik and its individual aspects that co-create this concept, as a rate of religiosity; the interconnection of Catholicism with polish statehood; Christianity as a part of national identity and historical events during which the Polak-Katolik connection was strengthened. Although the Polak- Katolik model was created in the 19th century, the roots of this connection can be observed from the beginnings of the Polish history to the present. The thesis then focuses in more detail on selected historical milestones in Polish history, which shows, how the elements of Catholicism permeated into the identity of Poles. The thesis assumes that the permeation of polish-catholic occurred mainly in critical periods. Therefore, for the purposes of the work, mainly events were selected when the existence of the Polish nation was threatened and faith together with the Roman Catholic Church played significant role in its preservation, such as during the siege of the monastery in Czenstochowa, the period of polish partition and the period of communism. The final chapter deals with the current situation of Catholicism in Poland, the...

I find a significant positive compensation premium for executives employed by firms headquartered in Catholic counties. I document that the compensation premium holds only for board member executives and that it is related to weaker corporate governance in Catholic regions. In addition, I explore several corporate governance measures and reveal that weaker corporate governance is a result of more developed connection networks among executives in Catholic regions. I document that even though a denser executive's social network is associated with worse operating performance, it enables the executive to reach higher pay. Therefore, I suggest that executives in Catholic regions are using their more developed social networks and weaker corporate governance to extract additional rents from the firm. My findings are consistent with a larger development of social ties in more community-focused Catholic regions than in more individualistic Protestant regions. I contribute by showing how religion deters efficiency of the top executive labor market through social ties.

Dublin Easter Rising of 1916 is widely recognized as an example of an intersection between nationalism and religion due to its use of the Christian symbolism of redemption via sacrifice. The religious aura, surrounding its leader and main ideologue, Patrick Pearse, was both a source of his posthumous "triumph" - the Irish independence shaped to a large extent by his legacy, and his "black legend" of the spiritual father of the sectarian violence in the twentieth century Irish politics. Due to the high degree of politicization of the debate over Pearse's role in Irish history, his intellectual legacy was rarely treated sine ira et studio. After a delineation of the problematic legacy of Pearse in the context of Irish Studies and the general introduction to the theme of the relations between nationalism and religion, this work proceeds to the re-examination of the place of religion in Pearse's thought. Pearse's conceptualization of Irish nationalism should be perceived as a synthesis emerging from the interplay between his deep indebtedness to the religious mind-frame and the Romantic and modernist influences that shaped the atmosphere of the pre-1914 Europe. It is based on a structural analogy between the Church and the nation. The analogy is created by means of a mechanism of the transposition of...

This dissertation Michael Novak and Patrick Buchanan as Major Representatives of Contemporary American Political Catholicism compares the political thought of two faces of contemporary American political Catholicism represented by the neoconservative Michael Novak and the paleoconservative Patrick J. Buchanan. The first part deals with the context of contemporary political Catholicism and its historical background. The comparison thematizes five problem fields: the issue of democracy and American political system, economic problems, question of foreign policy, the issue of religion and Catholicism and, finally, the conflict over the basis of conservatism. To accomplish the given objective, I analyse the work of both authors, compare their respective ideological positions and set them in the context of other major authors in the given areas and in the context of established political theories. The comparison shows that they both emphasize the significance of the religious and moral aspect of democracy, especially in the American context, however, they do not agree on the universal reach of democratic ideals. In the field of economics, they stand for different views: Novak is an economic neoliberal, while Buchanan a radical economic nationalist. Similarly in relation to foreign policy, Novak...

(in English): The thesis deals with the history of arianism. It emphasizes the historical and theology-philosohical conext of arianism, which is essential for understanding the whole topic and especially for understanding the development of the early Christians' faith. It outlines how the early Christians perceived their faith, which is important in order to grasp the basic principles and understanding of early beliefs also outlines the context of late antique philosophy that influenced the theological-philosophical framework of orthodoxy and arianism itself. The text of the thesis focuses on the political situation in Europe at the end of antiquity, the rise of arianism in the first half of the fourth century and its dispute with orthodoxy, whose dogma has been defined during the council of Constantinople (381). Already before the beginning of second council in Constantinople arianism started to spread through the barbarian tribes, the Goths, Vandals and Burgundians to the West, where it was incorporated into the policy of tribal States. Thanks to these tribes arianism survived in the West until the sixth century. The thesis brings incentive for further research of Arianism in the context of religious and political relations in the Western and Eastern parts of the Roman Empire in the early Middle Ages.

The aim of the dissertation is a comparative analysis of the English royal court in the first half of the 17th century. The analytical part of the dissertation focuses on researching processes that influenced the structure and roles in the royal court in regards to the political, religious, economic, social and cultural development of the world. The benchmarks represent the personality of the ruler, institutional structure and personnel composition of the court, its financing and its culture. The comparison is a defined period of time between the beginning of James I (1603) and the end of the personal rule of Charles I (1640). The dissertation is based on critical analysis of the sources and studies of secondary literature. One of the features of the Royal Court during the rule of James I was the rivalry of various factions. In the interest of retaining a balance in power, the monarch revealed selected offices only to members of his Scottish clubs. Targeted strengthening of the influences of selected institutions of court, especially Bedchamber, ended up contributing to a significant weakening of the unitary system of the government, where the Privy Council played a key role up until then. In addition, between 1603 and 1625, there became a strong concentration of power in the hands of the royal...

Aim of this thesis is to explore the activities and hierarchy of the Catholic peace movement in czechoslovakia during the years 1948-1968, especially the so called national peace board, Velehrad board and Peace movement of catholic clergy in comparison with overall the so called peace ideology. The Josef plojhar will be accented in the thesis, he was the head of these movements and also he represented the wing of so called patriotic priests.