ABSTRACT
A process of 'Lithuanization' began as a result of religious education in the native language that was organized on a broad scale in order to prevent attempts of the Tsarist government to replace the Polish-Catholic influence by Russian Orthodoxy. The intellectual potential of the new priests was used not only in the struggle against Polish influence or the pressure of the Tsarist government, but also to create a Catholic alternative to the ideological programmes of the newly emerging social and national movements. The declaration of Lithuanian independence of 1918 gave an additional impetus to the alliance between Catholicism and Lithuanian nationalism. The religious structure in the first Republic of Lithuania was fairly monolithic. The Theological-Philosophical Faculty of the university in Kaunas offered not only higher education for the clergy but also degrees in the humanities for lay people.
