Mokslo ir tikėjimo dialogai

The article analyses axiological and hodegetic ideas by M. Pečkauskaitė-Šatrijos Ragana. Aspects of neotomistic ethics in the writer’s attitude towards human virtuousness and preparation for eschatological fulfilment are highlighted. Cultivation of virtues is revealed as an essential prerequisite to faith. Virtuousness reveals to people horizons of freeing truth and a possibility to overstep human imperfection. Love is actualised in this context as a fundamental value with eschatological continuity and remaining in the hope and perspective of divine eternity. An important role in M. Pečkauskaitė’s pedagogical concept is assigned to personal self-reflection enabling self-knowledge and an adequate evaluation of one’s actions and spiritual culture. Eschatological conception of the meaning of time, when all human attempts are directed towards eternal perspective, is presented.

In today’s productivity-oriented culture, topics related to death, illness, and loss are avoided. However, sooner or later people fall ill, die and various losses accompany everyone’s life. These experiences come together with spiritual pain, grief, tension, anxiety, fear and anger. If not addressed properly, these feelings cause physical and mental illnesses, loss of one’s identity, psychological trauma and interfere with fulfilling relationships. Spiritual health is the most important indicator of human health and the quality of life. It is also vital to the overall health of a person and is related to the essence of a human being and to what is valued and truly cherished by a particular person. This article reveals the changes in the state of a person in the presence of a disease from a psychological and theological perspective by analysing scientific literature, interpreting and systematizing information.

We will analyse the cultural phenomenon as a product created by human genius. We will ask how works the interaction of culture and human life today and how cultural transformation influences the process of modelling perceptions of man himself. We will analyse how the cultural perception of what is “normal” or what is “value” is replaced by what is pleasant and useful. How a new concept of normality and value is created. We are creating a society on the foundation of exceptions without borders or a respectful and tolerant society?

23rd October 2017 commemorated the 30th anniversary of the Council of Europe Declaration of Santiago de Compostela. After the declaration was made, routes of the Camino de Santiago were drawn throughout Europe and Lithuania as well. This article briefly presents the sources and development of the Way of Saint James and its extensions into Lithuania. Commemorating the anniversaries of the establishment of the Samogitian diocese (1417) and Telšiai diocese (1926), the attention is focused on the routes of the Camino de Santiago in the territory of the Telšiai diocese.

Self-leadership as self-directed leadership is based on the values of the whole person according to all his/her natural needs to strive not only for their sociobiological satisfaction, but also for God, a spirituality, nobility, higher meaning based on incomparable ideals. The pursuit of values is aided by following leaders, including clergy as moral authorities. This is especially necessary from a point of view of the special psychological experiences in the maritime business. The moral and business authority of the leader is valid for employees as the most important psychological support for their activities. Transcendental motivation is noble and very practical in all cases of professional and personal life. Ideally, becoming a leader is based on authentic following God as the great Leader. There are many opportunities to strengthen the self-leadership of maritime business participants on the basis of secular values. The difference is that parents, brothers or sisters, a friend, a clergyman, TV shows, and movies are more involved in the formation of sociocentric values. Parents, wife, familiar seafarer, teachers, board leaders or leaders in a port company, clergyman, TV shows, films, and NGOs are the most significant moral authorities for the transcendent values of maritime business participants.

The article deals with the attitude to Protestantism in the post-soviet Russia. Formation of Protestantism in Russia can be considered in the present paper. Thus, the purposes of this research are to examine formation of Protestantism in Russia, to analyze attitude of Russians to Protestantism and to identify its reasons. The author’s periodization of Protestantism formation in Russia is proposed. This periodization is based on 3 criteria: types of Protestants activities at each stage; the government’s attitude to it; its functions. It is shown that the establishment of the Russian Protestantism version took five basic steps. In modern Russia, Protestantism has its own history, values it gained its traditions, and it has its own distinctive character. Protestant churches are ready to actively participate in solving the pressing issues facing the people of the country. The authors suggest that the most authoritative of them can and should acquire the status of social partners of state institutions and significantly contribute to the spiritual and moral education of young people, to overcoming child homelessness and neglect, to family strengthening, to improvement of moral atmosphere in society and to the formation of high standards of business, economic and work ethic. The positive development of this process and its dynamics are largely dependent on Russian Protestants consolidation and on their willingness and ability to develop and strengthen interfaith relations and cooperation. According to the article, the attitude of most Russians to Protestantism is largely negative, although most of them have friends or acquaintances among the followers of this religion. The reasons for this are stereotypes in the public opinion of Russians: about the church itself (simplification of ceremonies, of the Bible, of the decoration of the church), and about the personal qualities of the congregation (the rejection of community service and charity, lack of citizenship).

A man living in an ultramodern society is increasingly questioning the meaning of his own existence, which is closely related to the finding of the answer of his own identity and the understanding of his place in the family and the society. In this process the very important place goes to the question of males self-realization in the labor market and to the way how a woman enters in to the labor market. The relationship between these two protagonists – the man and the woman – and the correlation of that relationship is what brings the man or the father to identity crises. The influence of the labor market is one of the most important factors contributing to identity crises in the sphere of been a male and in the sphere of being a woman. In this article we will analyse the changes of the ultramodern society, which have their connection with the transformations in the labor market and their influence on the men and the fathers of the ultramodern society.

The spiritual aspect is one of essential components of human existence; therefore, it becomes an integral part of holistic support to a human being. Christian spiritual assistance in its various forms is becoming gradually established in our country, and there are attempts to define it in both juridical and theological or psychological aspects. Therefore, it requires a deeper glance and a more detailed analysis. In relation to this problem, the article deals with features of Christian spiritual assistance in the context of perception of spirituality and its relation to psychological support. Relevant approaches to spirituality, features of spiritual and psychological counselling as well as importance of Christ-centred spiritual assistance are discussed.

The tradition of the European maritime culture is directly related to development of spiritual and mental horizons of the personality. The most prominent factors of the maritime development are as follows: Arabic origins of the maritime navigation and astrophysics; Greek mythology and philosophy raising sea symbols; maritime missions, which have been encouraged from the Judeo-Christian mentality and manifested on new geographic and ethnographic discoveries. The decisive role of this mentality appeared in formation of European states and institutional culture, in development of literacy and rising of universities from monastic libraries (X–XI c.) and first Portuguese maritime schools (XV c.). Aim of the research is a revelation of moments of a transcendental ideal of the European maritime self-concept as an important cultural leap. Tasks of the research are as follows: analysis of a pagan basis of the maritime self-concept, and discussion of a valuable direction of the Judeo-Christian maritime self-concept. The research type is theoretically descriptive. There were used such research methods: retrospective, comparative, heuristic analysis of scientific literature, interpretation, systemization and synthesis. Methodological attitude is neotomism that refers to the transcendental ideal of the European culture identity formation in long-term prospect.

for a long time to Lithuanian researchers. Therefore, German historiographic and local traditions became the knowledge transferor about the first churches in the Prussian lands to the north of the right bank of the Nemunas. The thinking constructs formed by German historiographic and local traditions were accepted without critical evaluation of Lithuanian historiography. The age of particular buildings was directly linked to the first mention of parishes or believers’ community, artefacts, local traditions and etc. However, such uncritical access is not always good. This is evidenced by the case of Rusnė (Russ) church and the story of the “aging” of Viešvilė (Wischwill) church which has been discussed more widely in the article.