CATHOLIC LEFT AND MARXISM IN SLOVENIA AFTER THE SECOND VATICAN COUNCIL: IDEOLOGICAL CONTAMINATION AND ITS POLITICAL CONSEQUENCES

The article deals with the reception of Marxism and especially the Yugoslav self-management socialism among leftist-oriented Slovenian Catholic theologians and laymen from the end of the 1960s to the end of the 1980s. It focuses on the circumstances concerning the formation of the so-called socialist theology under the ideological leadership of the Maribor auxiliary bishop Vekoslav Grmic. The article also examines the responses to these activities by the League of Communists and Marxist philosophers. The discussion deals with the changes of the social doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church under the popes John XXIII and Paul VI, which enabled the development of the dialogue with non-believers (especially Marxists) from the mid-sixties of the previous century. On the other hand, such a dialogue depended on the development of Western "Marxist humanism", when its leading supporters abandoned some of the traditional views of Marxist-Leninist criticism of religion, and in this way opened the doors for the reinterpretation of its role in the pursuit of a socialist renewal. Because Christianity and Marxism in Slovenia drew closer under the strong influence of these flows, conceptual influences are presented in the paper, which were decisive for the emergence of Grmic's theological opus. Based on the analysis of these texts, some of the main highlights of his theological thought are exposed. Furthermore, the author tries to comprehend the attitude of the auxiliary bishop towards the policy of the League of Communists in relation to believers. In order to maintain party's authoritative and ideological monopoly, this attitude was the key element for assessing the regime's socialist theology; rather more than its content which had been mostly overlooked. On the basis of this fact we can determine how the League of Communists saw the recognition of religious motivation for the engagement of Christians in the construction of a socialist society.