Obraz konfesií a kultúr v katolíckej kázňovej próze na Slovensku v 18. storočí
The Image of Confessions and Cultures in the Catholic Sermonic Prose in the 18th Century Slovakia

Summary/Abstract: The sermonic prose represents a significant part of the 18th century literary works. It was in this century when the Slovak Catholic preachers started publishing sermons in the native (Slovak) language. The excerpts of the occasional sermonic speeches of the contemporary prominent preachers were made accessible to the wider public by a priest and a literary historian Michal Rešetka in the two-volume anthology Kázňe prihodné (translates as Occasional Sermons) (I. 1831, II. 1834). The texts of the anthology do not clarify only the rhetorical strategy of the individual preachers, but also inform – though some of them rather fragmentarily – about their respective views on the current issues of the religious and cultural life. Several preachers stress the negative phenomena of the religious life: except the disruption of the religious unity, they thematize the mutual disagreements and differences of the Christian community. From the positive influences, the participation of Church in the upbringing and education of youth is highlighted the most (particularly in the sermons dedicated to Joseph Calasanz). In the sermons, the European cultures are not brought back as wholes, but through individual personalities and their morally good or bad deeds. The religious circumstances are reflected upon separately by the author of an occasional sermonic speech Duchovne kazaní (A Spiritual Sermon) (1746) who compares the Roman-Catholic Church to a boat sailing on a rough sea with both the Roman Catholics and the “worshippers of the Greek and Russian faith”, i.e. “Russniaks” on board.

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