GARĪGĀ PRETOŠANĀS UN TĀS PIEMĒRI LATVIJAS ROMAS KATOĻU BAZNĪCĀ PADOMJU LAIKĀ
SPIRITUAL RESISTANCE AND ITS EXAMPLES IN THE LATVIAN ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH DURING THE SOVIET ERA

Summary/Abstract: The article aims to clarify the concept of “spiritual resistance” by drawing on the theological ideas of Henri de Lubac and Dietrich Bonhoeffer. It seeks to establish a comprehensive framework for understanding spiritual resistance and to assess its applicability in examining cases of resistance within the history of the Latvian Roman Catholic Church during the Soviet era. This article examines the spiritual resistance to the Soviet regime within the Latvian Roman Catholic Church. It focuses on how clergy and laity made individual choices to preserve their religious tradition, theological ideas, and practices in the face of Soviet totalitarianism. Despite the forced coexistence with the Soviet regime and the Church’s institutional conformism, the courage and enduring faith of the clergy and laity allowed them to maintain their religious tradition. The cases discussed in the article illustrate various ways individuals and communities attempted to preserve their spiritual integrity amid systemic repression. They also demonstrate how personal expressions of faith intersected with the collective endeavours of the Church as a community of believers to uphold spiritual practices, beliefs, and institutions clandestinely. Therefore, examining these cases unveils spiritual resistance’s multifaceted, complex, and sometimes conflicting nature. The article suggests that we could better understand cases of spiritual resistance in the Latvian Roman Catholic Church by considering the social theory of French sociologist and anthropologist Pierre Bourdieu in addition to theological aspects from de Lubac and Bonhoeffer. By incorporating Bourdieu’s perspectives on power, cultural capital, habitus, and fields, we can gain deeper insight into the social dynamics and power structures opposed by Lubac and Bonhoeffer. Bourdieu’s concept of symbolic violence can provide a more comprehensive understanding of the religious field. The actions of de Lubac, Bonhoeffer, and the Latvian Roman Catholic Church can be seen as attempts to challenge the symbolic violence imposed by the Nazi and Soviet occupation regimes, creating new forms of cultural and social capital to resist the imposed structures. From this perspective, Bourdieu’s theory aids in understanding spiritual resistance not just as an individual act of defiance and disobedience but as a multifaceted and crucial social phenomenon that can profoundly impact and alter the values and behavioural dynamics within a totalitarian regime.

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