Standpoint of intellectual Catholic youth on capitalism and socialism in Lithuania between two world wars

Straipsnyje yra nagrinėjamos jaunosios kartos katalikų intelektualų pažiūros į kapitalizmą bei socializmą tarpukario Lietuvoje. Jaunosios kartos lietuvių katalikai intelektualai vertino realius ekonominius kapitalizmo procesus atsižvelgdami į moralines normas, stengėsi atkreipti dėmesį į neigiamų socialinių to meto kapitalistinės sistemos veikimo padarinių įtaką žmogaus dvasingumui bei individo saviraiškos plėtotei. Pagrindinį kapitalizmo dėsnį, t.y. pelno siekimą ir kaupimą, jie pripažino kaip neišvengiamai sukeliantį socialinę įtampą tarp darbdavių (savininkų) ir samdomų darbininkų. Sąžiningai atlikdamas savo darbą individas, pirmiausia užsitikrina socialinę paramą, tačiau jis turi gauti ją ir iš valstybės. Ekonominis ir etinis principai turi būti suderinti. Jaunosios kartos lietuvių katalikų intelektualams buvo aiškus skirtumas tarp socializmo teorinio modelio bei socializmo praktikos. Socialinio teisingumo atkūrimo svarbiausias faktorius – dvasinis stimulas. Jo nebuvimas sąlygoja darbdavių ir samdomų darbuotojų santykiuose išryškėjantį bedvasiškumą ir susipriešinimą. Jaunosios kartos katalikų lietuvių intelektualai demistifikavo darbininkų klasę, jiems nebuvo priimtini prievartiniai ,,realiojo socializmo“ vykdyti pertvarkymai, tačiau neatmetė socializmo sukūrimo galimybės tinkamai paruošus visuomenę. Jų manymu, visuomenės gerovės garantas – individo sąmoningumas, jo dvasinio ir kultūrinio tobulėjimo pastangos. Dėl to jaunieji oponavo komunistų bei kairiosios inteligentijos diegiamai nuostatai, esą socializmas yra neišvengiamas ir dėsningas visuomenės raidos padarinys.Intellectual Catholic youth (A. Maceina, P. Jakas, P. Dielininkaitis and others) observed and identified the real consequences of the results of the development of capitalistic system at that time and its influence upon a human spirit and the possibilities of self-expression of an individual. They recognized that the key law of capitalism - to get and accumulate profits - provokes a social stress between employers (owners) and employees. It was thought that such stress may be overcome in the only way: employers and employees must willingly and consciously restrict their egoism and look for a cooperation (partnership), but not for a confrontation. [...] The intellectual Catholic youth singled out socialism as a theoretical model and the practice of socialism as its implementation in the realty. In their critical evaluation of the measures of restoration of justice, suggested by adepts of socialism, especially a compulsory socialization of the means of production, they disclosed social and economical inefficiency of mechanical transformations, its contradiction to the nature and aspirations of a human. Simultaneously they recognized an importance of social transformations in a restoration of social justice but considered a spiritual stimulus to be of the key importance in a successful realization of such transformations. Namely the absence of it causes a soullessness and hostility, which in social plane are mostly expressed in relations of employers and employees. The young intellectual Catholics tried to single out the factors which united, but not separated them. Aspiration to socialism as the ideal of a better and more truthful society depends on a human; its realization more depends on the consciousness and efforts in spiritual and cultural improvement of an individual than the will of the state, the governing party. Nobody knows and can exactly say, how long it will continue, but it is a matter of a human, not of history. So, the youth virtually negated the statement on socialism as an inevitable and lawful result if evolution of the society and in this way opposed to the efforts of local communists and the left intelligentsia to present such role of it to the society of that time. Stressing the importance of conscious efforts of an individual in striving for a better life, they belittled the pretensions of local communists to be leaders of the working people to the bright future, shielding themselves with the veil of fighters for social equality and social justice, and in this way to be entitled to become the masters and uncontrolled managers of that future. On the other hand, stressing a necessity of a respect to a personality of an individual, his/her spiritual aspirations in a performance of social transformations, the young intellectual Catholics encouraged to take an attentive look at the social experiment performed in the neighbouring state - Soviet Russia. They encouraged to evaluate more critically the prophecies of local adepts of socialism as well. In this way they warned the Lithuanian people on the possible consequences of such social experiment, realized under compulsion