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Varniai Priest Seminary
Kaunas Priest Seminary ( lt, Kauno kunigų seminarija) is the largest seminary in Lithuania serving the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Kaunas. It is part of the Faculty of Theology of Vytautas Magnus University. Its current rector is Aurelijus Žukauskas. As of 2007, the seminary had 35 students. It traces its history to 1622. History The Diocese of Samogitia did not have its own school for priests. Therefore, Bishops of Samogitia sponsored students at the Jesuit Academy in Vilnius, which was established in 1570. In 1622, Bishop Stanisław Kiszka decided to sponsor a separate seminary in Varniai, the seat of the diocese. In 1628, the seminary moved to Kražiai where it shared premises with the Jesuit Kražiai College until 1745. Bishop decided to move the seminary back to Varniai. There he built a brick house dedicated to the seminary's needs. From 1850 to 1862, 333 men were ordained as priests. In 1862, the seminary had 120 students. After the January Uprising of 1863, the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lithuania
Lithuania (; lt, Lietuva ), officially the Republic of Lithuania ( lt, Lietuvos Respublika, links=no ), is a country in the Baltic region of Europe. It is one of three Baltic states and lies on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea. Lithuania shares land borders with Latvia to the north, Belarus to the east and south, Poland to the south, and Russia to the southwest. It has a Maritime boundary, maritime border with Sweden to the west on the Baltic Sea. Lithuania covers an area of , with a population of 2.8 million. Its capital and largest city is Vilnius; other major cities are Kaunas and Klaipėda. Lithuanians belong to the ethno-linguistic group of the Balts and speak Lithuanian language, Lithuanian, one of only a few living Baltic languages. For millennia the southeastern shores of the Baltic Sea were inhabited by various Balts, Baltic tribes. In the 1230s, Lithuanian lands were united by Mindaugas, Monarchy of Lithuania, becoming king and founding the Kingdom of Lithuania ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. The rise of the Russian Empire coincided with the decline of neighbouring rival powers: the Swedish Empire, the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, Qajar Iran, the Ottoman Empire, and Qing China. It also held colonies in North America between 1799 and 1867. Covering an area of approximately , it remains the third-largest empire in history, surpassed only by the British Empire and the Mongol Empire; it ruled over a population of 125.6 million people per the 1897 Russian census, which was the only census carried out during the entire imperial period. Owing to its geographic extent across three continents at its peak, it featured great ethnic, linguistic, religious, and economic diversity. From the 10th–17th centuries, the land ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Šiluva
Šiluva is a small town of less than 700 inhabitants in Lithuania. It is located in the region of Samogitia. It is a major site of Catholic pilgrimage in Lithuania. History Šiluva was first mentioned in 1457 in relation to the building of the Church of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the Apostles Saint Peter and Saint Bartholomew by the Lithuanian noble Petras Gedgaudas. Later the ''Feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary'' attracted huge numbers of the faithful to Šiluva, some from as far away of what later became Protestant Prussia. With the advent of the Reformation in 16th century Lithuania, many of the inhabitants of the Šiluva region converted to Calvinism. This caused the church to eventually be ransacked and closed around 1569. The last parish priest, John Holubka, buried the remaining church valuables and legal documents and deeds in an iron box near the vandalized church. Subsequent attempts by the Catholics to regain the property thr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pope John Paul II
Pope John Paul II ( la, Ioannes Paulus II; it, Giovanni Paolo II; pl, Jan Paweł II; born Karol Józef Wojtyła ; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 1978 until his death in April 2005, and was later canonised as Pope Saint John Paul II. He was elected pope by the second papal conclave of 1978, which was called after John Paul I, who had been elected in August to succeed Pope Paul VI, died after 33 days. Cardinal Wojtyła was elected on the third day of the conclave and adopted the name of his predecessor in tribute to him. Born in Poland, John Paul II was the first non-Italian pope since Adrian VI in the 16th century and the second-longest-serving pope after Pius IX in modern history. John Paul II attempted to improve the Catholic Church's relations with Judaism, Islam, and the Eastern Orthodox Church. He maintained the church's previous positions on such matters as abortion, artificia ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Soviet Deportations From Lithuania
Soviet deportations from Lithuania were a series of 35 mass deportations carried out in Lithuania, a country that was occupied as a constituent socialist republic of the Soviet Union, in 1941 and 1945–1952. At least 130,000 people, 70% of them women and children, were forcibly transported to labor camps and other forced settlements in remote parts of the Soviet Union, particularly in the Irkutsk Oblast and Krasnoyarsk Krai. Among the deportees were about 4,500 Poles. These deportations do not include Lithuanian partisans or political prisoners (approximately 150,000 people) deported to Gulags (prison camps). Deportations of the civilians served a double purpose: repressing resistance to Sovietization policies in Lithuania and providing free labor in sparsely inhabited areas of the Soviet Union. Approximately 28,000 of Lithuanian deportees died in exile due to poor living conditions. After Stalin's death in 1953, the deportees were slowly and gradually released. The last deportee ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Soviet Occupation Of The Baltic States (1944)
The Soviet Union (USSR) occupied most of the territory of the Baltic states in its 1944 Baltic Offensive during World War II. Dear (2001). p. 85. The Red Army regained control over the three Baltic capitals and encircled retreating Wehrmacht and Latvian forces in the Courland Pocket where they held out until the final German surrender at the end of the war. The German forces were deported and the leaders of Latvian collaborating forces were executed as traitors. After the war, the Baltic territories were reorganized into constituent republics of the USSR until they declared independence in 1990 amid the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. Soviet offensives and reoccupation By 2 February 1944 the siege of Leningrad was over and the Soviet troops were on the border with Estonia. Bellamy (2007). p. 621. Having failed to break through, the Soviets launched the Tartu Offensive on 10 August, and the Baltic Offensive on 14 September with forces totalling 1.5 million. Th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Troškūnai
Troškūnai (; pl, Traszkuny) is the second smallest city in Lithuania. It is located west from Anykščiai. History Troškūnai first mentioned in historical sources in 1506, the estate of Troškūnai (or estate of Smėlynė) existed in 16th century. Troškūnai became a town in the 17th-18th centuries when the church of St Trinity Church and Bernardine Monastery in the style of late baroque according to the project of the architect Martin Knakfus were built. In 1698 Troškūnai got a privilege to organise markets. The Bernardine monastery became an important center of cultural life. The monks were active in resistance against the Russian tsarist regime. In 1773 the school in which children of noblemen, town dwellers and local peasants were educated. In 1781 20 children from peasant families, 4 children from Troškūnai and 8 children from nobleman families attended lessons. The building of the school (1796) survives up to this day. The birthplace of Lithuanian lexicographe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fighting occurring throughout Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Pacific, and parts of Asia. An estimated 9 million soldiers were killed in combat, plus another 23 million wounded, while 5 million civilians died as a result of military action, hunger, and disease. Millions more died in genocides within the Ottoman Empire and in the 1918 influenza pandemic, which was exacerbated by the movement of combatants during the war. Prior to 1914, the European great powers were divided between the Triple Entente (comprising France, Russia, and Britain) and the Triple Alliance (containing Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Italy). Tensions in the Balkans came to a head on 28 June 1914, following the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Maironis
Maironis (born Jonas Mačiulis, ; – 28 June 1932) was a Lithuanian Roman Catholic priest and the greatest and most-known Lithuanian poet, especially of the period of the Lithuanian press ban. He was called the Bard of Lithuanian National Revival (). Maironis was active in public life. However, the Lithuanian literary historian Juozas Brazaitis writes that Maironis was not. In his poetry, he expressed the national aspirations of the Lithuanian National Revival and was highly influential in Lithuanian society and poetry. The Maironian school in Lithuanian literature was named after him. Life Early years Jonas Mačiulis was born in manor, , , in Russian-occupied Lithuania on . Maironis' parents were free peasants who maintained close relations with the polonized Lithuanian nobility. Such a social environment formed the basis of Maironis' personality, leading to his deep religiosity and loyalty to tradition, free from atheistic or liberal influences. Socially, Maironis was u ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Knygnešiai
Lithuanian book smugglers or Lithuanian book carriers ( lt, knygnešys, plural: lt, knygnešiaĩ, label=none) transported Lithuanian language books printed in the Latin alphabet into Lithuanian-speaking areas of the Russian Empire, defying a ban on such materials in force from 1864 to 1904. In Lithuanian it literally means ''the one who carries the books''. Opposing imperial Russian authorities' efforts to replace the traditional Latin orthography with Cyrillic, and transporting printed matter from as far away as the United States to do so, the book smugglers became a symbol of Lithuanians' resistance to Russification. History After the Polish-Lithuanian insurrection of 1863, the Russian Imperial government intensified its efforts to Russify the Lithuanian population and alienate it from its historic roots, including the Roman Catholic faith, which had become widespread during the years of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. During the summer of 1863 Tsar Alexander II i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
