Antyklerykalizm szlachecki w Rzeczypospolitej Obojga Narodów jako problem badawczy

Anticlericalism of the nobility in the Polish‑Lithuanian Commonwealth as a research problemArticle is a polemic. The author indicates her distance from the theory of W. Reinhard and H. Schilling, as well as the thesis of some Polish historians, that guarantees religious equality in the Warsaw Confederation of 1573 blocked the process of confessionalization, which is (according to this theory) a necessary condition for modernization of the state and society in the early modern era. In her view, the relationship between the processes of confessionalization and modernization in the Polish‑Lithuanian Commonwealth significantly differs from the model constructed on the basis of the relations in the German Reich – among others, due to socio‑economic nature of the conflict between secular and spiritual states vying for dominance in the Commonwealth from the 16th to the 18th century. Basing on a critical review of the literature and polemical texts, she tries to prove another thesis, that anti‑clericalism of the Polish and Lithuanian nobility can be seen as a manifestation of secularizing trends in Europe in the era of modern confessionalisation. Then she points to unexplored issues, necessary for checking the credibility of allegations against the clergy. In conclusion, she expresses the hope, that further research of religious relations in the Polish‑Lituanian Republic will lead on the final stage to the creation of synthetic studies relating not only to the origins and manifestations of anti‑clericalism of nobility, but also to a new interpretation of the role of the Roman Catholic clergy in its history.