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Anti-Catholicism is hostility towards Catholics or opposition to the
Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
, its
clergy
Clergy are formal leaders within established religions. Their roles and functions vary in different religious traditions, but usually involve presiding over specific rituals and teaching their religion's doctrines and practices. Some of the ter ...
, and/or its adherents. At various points after the
Reformation
The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...
, some majority
Protestant
Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...
states, including
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
,
Prussia
Prussia, , Old Prussian: ''Prūsa'' or ''Prūsija'' was a German state on the southeast coast of the Baltic Sea. It formed the German Empire under Prussian rule when it united the German states in 1871. It was ''de facto'' dissolved by an em ...
,
Scotland
Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...
, and the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
, turned anti-Catholicism, opposition to the
Pope
The pope ( la, papa, from el, πάππας, translit=pappas, 'father'), also known as supreme pontiff ( or ), Roman pontiff () or sovereign pontiff, is the bishop of Rome (or historically the patriarch of Rome), head of the worldwide Cathol ...
(
anti-Papalism), mockery of
Catholic rituals, and opposition to Catholic adherents into major political themes. The anti-Catholic sentiment which resulted from this trend frequently led to
religious discrimination
Religious discrimination is treating a person or group differently because of the particular beliefs which they hold about a religion. This includes instances when adherents of different religions, denominations or non-religions are treated u ...
against Catholic communities and individuals and it occasionally led to the
religious persecution
Religious persecution is the systematic mistreatment of an individual or a group of individuals as a response to their religion, religious beliefs or affiliations or their irreligion, lack thereof. The tendency of societies or groups within soc ...
of them (frequently, they were
derogatorily referred to as "
papists" or "
Romanists" in
Anglophone and Protestant countries.) Historian John Wolffe identifies four types of anti-Catholicism: constitutional-national, theological, popular and socio-cultural.
Historically, Catholics who lived in Protestant countries were frequently
suspected of conspiring against the state in furtherance of papal interests. Their support of the alien pope led to allegations that they lacked loyalty to the state. In majority Protestant countries which experienced large scale
immigration
Immigration is the international movement of people to a destination country of which they are not natives or where they do not possess citizenship in order to settle as permanent residents or naturalized citizens. Commuters, tourists, and ...
, such as the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...
and
Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...
, suspicion of Catholic immigrants and/or discrimination against them frequently overlapped or was conflated with
nativist,
xenophobic,
ethnocentric
Ethnocentrism in social science and anthropology—as well as in colloquial English discourse—means to apply one's own culture or ethnicity as a frame of reference to judge other cultures, practices, behaviors, beliefs, and people, instead of ...
and/or
racist
Racism is the belief that groups of humans possess different behavioral traits corresponding to inherited attributes and can be divided based on the superiority of one race over another. It may also mean prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism ...
sentiments (i.e.
anti-Irish sentiment
Anti-Irish sentiment includes oppression, persecution, discrimination, or hatred of Irish people as an ethnic group or a nation. It can be directed against the island of Ireland in general, or directed against Irish emigrants and their descendan ...
,
anti-Italianism
Anti-Italianism or Italophobia is a negative attitude regarding Italian people or people with Italian ancestry, often expressed through the use of prejudice, discrimination or stereotypes. Its opposite is Italophilia.
In the United States
Anti ...
,
Hispanophobia
Hispanophobia (from Latin ''Hispanus'', "Spanish" and Greek φοβία (''phobia''), "fear") or anti-Spanish sentiment is a fear, distrust, hatred of; aversion to, or discrimination against the Spanish language, Hispanic, Latino and/or Span ...
, and
anti-Slavic sentiment
Anti-Slavic sentiment, also known as Slavophobia, a form of racism or xenophobia, refers to various negative attitudes towards Slavs, Slavic peoples, the most common manifestation is the claim that the inhabitants of Slavic nations are inferior t ...
, specifically
anti-Polish sentiment
Polonophobia, also referred to as anti-Polonism, ( pl, Antypolonizm), and anti-Polish sentiment are terms for negative attitudes, prejudices, and actions against Poles as an ethnic group, Poland as their country, and their culture. These incl ...
).
In the
Early modern period, the Catholic Church struggled to maintain its traditional religious and political role in the face of rising secular power in Catholic countries. As a result of these struggles, a hostile attitude towards the considerable political, social, spiritual and religious power of the Pope and the clergy arose in majority Catholic countries in the form of
anti-clericalism
Anti-clericalism is opposition to religious authority, typically in social or political matters. Historical anti-clericalism has mainly been opposed to the influence of Roman Catholicism. Anti-clericalism is related to secularism, which seeks to ...
. The
Inquisition
The Inquisition was a group of institutions within the Catholic Church whose aim was to combat heresy, conducting trials of suspected heretics. Studies of the records have found that the overwhelming majority of sentences consisted of penances, ...
was a favorite target of attack. After the outbreak of the
French Revolution
The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in November 1799. Many of its ideas are considere ...
in 1789, anti-clerical forces gained strength in some primarily Catholic nations, such as
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
,
Spain
, image_flag = Bandera de España.svg
, image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg
, national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond")
, national_anthem = (English: "Royal March")
, i ...
,
Mexico
Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...
, and certain regions of
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...
(especially in
Emilia-Romagna
egl, Emigliàn (man) egl, Emiglièna (woman) rgn, Rumagnòl (man) rgn, Rumagnòla (woman) it, Emiliano (man) it, Emiliana (woman) or it, Romagnolo (man) it, Romagnola (woman)
, population_note =
, population_blank1_title ...
). Certain political parties in these historically Catholic regions subscribed to and propagated an internal form of anti-Catholicism, generally known as anti-clericalism, that expressed a hostile attitude towards the Catholic Church as an establishment and the overwhelming political, social, spiritual and religious power of the Catholic Church, attacking the pope's power to name bishops and criticizing the perceived power of
Catholic international orders such as the
Jesuits
The Society of Jesus ( la, Societas Iesu; abbreviation: SJ), also known as the Jesuits (; la, Iesuitæ), is a religious order (Catholic), religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rom ...
.
In primarily Protestant countries
Protestant Reformers
Protestant Reformers were those theologians whose careers, works and actions brought about the Protestant Reformation of the 16th century.
In the context of the Reformation, Martin Luther was the first reformer (sharing his views publicly in 15 ...
, including
John Wycliffe,
Martin Luther
Martin Luther (; ; 10 November 1483 – 18 February 1546) was a German priest, theologian, author, hymnwriter, and professor, and Order of Saint Augustine, Augustinian friar. He is the seminal figure of the Reformation, Protestant Refo ...
,
Henry VIII
Henry VIII (28 June 149128 January 1547) was King of England from 22 April 1509 until his death in 1547. Henry is best known for his six marriages, and for his efforts to have his first marriage (to Catherine of Aragon) annulled. His disa ...
,
John Calvin
John Calvin (; frm, Jehan Cauvin; french: link=no, Jean Calvin ; 10 July 150927 May 1564) was a French theologian, pastor and reformer in Geneva during the Protestant Reformation. He was a principal figure in the development of the system ...
,
Thomas Cranmer
Thomas Cranmer (2 July 1489 – 21 March 1556) was a leader of the English Reformation and Archbishop of Canterbury during the reigns of Henry VIII, Edward VI and, for a short time, Mary I. He helped build the case for the annulment of Henry' ...
,
John Thomas,
John Knox
John Knox ( gd, Iain Cnocc) (born – 24 November 1572) was a Scottish minister, Reformed theologian, and writer who was a leader of the country's Reformation. He was the founder of the Presbyterian Church of Scotland.
Born in Giffordgat ...
,
Roger Williams
Roger Williams (21 September 1603between 27 January and 15 March 1683) was an English-born New England Puritan minister, theologian, and author who founded Providence Plantations, which became the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantation ...
,
Cotton Mather
Cotton Mather (; February 12, 1663 – February 13, 1728) was a New England Puritan clergyman and a prolific writer. Educated at Harvard College, in 1685 he joined his father Increase as minister of the Congregationalist Old North Meeting H ...
, and
John Wesley
John Wesley (; 2 March 1791) was an English people, English cleric, Christian theology, theologian, and Evangelism, evangelist who was a leader of a Christian revival, revival movement within the Church of England known as Methodism. The soci ...
, as well as most
Protestants
Protestantism is a branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century against what its followers perceived to b ...
of the 16th-19th centuries, identified the
Papacy with the Antichrist. The
Centuriators of Magdeburg
The ''Magdeburg Centuries'' is an ecclesiastical history, divided into thirteen ''centuries'', covering thirteen hundred years, ending in 1298; it was first published from 1559 to 1574. It was compiled by several Lutheran scholars in Magdeburg, k ...
, a group of
Lutheran
Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Catholic Church launched th ...
scholars in
Magdeburg
Magdeburg (; nds, label=Low Saxon, Meideborg ) is the capital and second-largest city of the German state Saxony-Anhalt. The city is situated at the Elbe river.
Otto I, the first Holy Roman Emperor and founder of the Archdiocese of Magdebur ...
which was headed by
Matthias Flacius, wrote the 12-volume ''
Magdeburg Centuries'' in order to discredit the Papacy and lead other Christians to recognize the Pope as the Antichrist. The fifth round of talks in the
Lutheran–Catholic dialogue notes,
Doctrinal works of literature which were published by the
Lutherans, the
Reformed churches, the
Presbyterians
Presbyterianism is a part of the Reformed tradition within Protestantism that broke from the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland by John Knox, who was a priest at St. Giles Cathedral (Church of Scotland). Presbyterian churches derive their nam ...
, the
Baptists
Baptists form a major branch of Protestantism distinguished by baptizing professing Christian believers only ( believer's baptism), and doing so by complete immersion. Baptist churches also generally subscribe to the doctrines of soul compe ...
, the
Anabaptists, and the
Methodists contain references to the Pope as the Antichrist, including the
Smalcald Articles, Article 4 (1537), the ''
Treatise on the Power and Primacy of the Pope
The ''Treatise on the Power and Primacy of the Pope'' (1537) (), ''The Tractate'' for short, is the seventh Lutheran credal document of the Book of Concord. Philip Melanchthon, its author, completed it on February 17, 1537 during the assembly of ...
'' (1537), the
Westminster Confession
The Westminster Confession of Faith is a Reformed confession of faith. Drawn up by the 1646 Westminster Assembly as part of the Westminster Standards to be a confession of the Church of England, it became and remains the " subordinate standard" ...
, Article 25.6 (1646), and the
1689 Baptist Confession of Faith
The Confession of Faith, also called the Second London Baptist Confession, was written by Particular Baptists, who held to a Calvinistic soteriology in England to give a formal expression of their Christian faith from a Baptist perspective. Beca ...
, Article 26.4. In 1754,
John Wesley
John Wesley (; 2 March 1791) was an English people, English cleric, Christian theology, theologian, and Evangelism, evangelist who was a leader of a Christian revival, revival movement within the Church of England known as Methodism. The soci ...
published his ''
Explanatory Notes Upon the New Testament
''Explanatory Notes Upon the New Testament'' is a Biblical commentary and translation of the New Testament by English theologian John Wesley. First published in 1755 the work went through five editions in Wesley's lifetime.Scroggs p.415
Developme ...
'', which is currently an official Doctrinal Standard of the
United Methodist Church
The United Methodist Church (UMC) is a worldwide mainline Protestant denomination based in the United States, and a major part of Methodism. In the 19th century, its main predecessor, the Methodist Episcopal Church, was a leader in evangelical ...
. In his notes on the
Book of Revelation
The Book of Revelation is the final book of the New Testament (and consequently the final book of the Christian Bible). Its title is derived from the first word of the Koine Greek text: , meaning "unveiling" or "revelation". The Book of R ...
(chapter 13), he commented: "The whole succession of Popes from
Gregory VII are undoubtedly Antichrists. Yet this hinders not, but that the last Pope in this succession will be more eminently the Antichrist, the Man of Sin, adding to that of his predecessors a peculiar degree of wickedness from the bottomless pit."
Referring to the Book of Revelation,
Edward Gibbon
Edward Gibbon (; 8 May 173716 January 1794) was an English historian, writer, and member of parliament. His most important work, ''The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'', published in six volumes between 1776 and 1788, is k ...
stated that "The advantage of turning those mysterious prophecies against the
See of Rome
The Holy See ( lat, Sancta Sedes, ; it, Santa Sede ), also called the See of Rome, Petrine See or Apostolic See, is the jurisdiction of the Pope in his role as the bishop of Rome. It includes the apostolic episcopal see of the Diocese of Rome ...
, inspired the Protestants with uncommon veneration for so useful an ally." Protestants condemned the Catholic policy of mandatory
celibacy
Celibacy (from Latin ''caelibatus'') is the state of voluntarily being unmarried, sexually abstinent, or both, usually for religious reasons. It is often in association with the role of a religious official or devotee. In its narrow sense, the ...
for priests.
During the
Enlightenment Era
The Age of Enlightenment or the Enlightenment; german: Aufklärung, "Enlightenment"; it, L'Illuminismo, "Enlightenment"; pl, Oświecenie, "Enlightenment"; pt, Iluminismo, "Enlightenment"; es, La Ilustración, "Enlightenment" was an intel ...
, which spanned the 17th and 18th centuries, with its strong emphasis on the need for
religious toleration
Religious toleration may signify "no more than forbearance and the permission given by the adherents of a dominant religion for other religions to exist, even though the latter are looked on with disapproval as inferior, mistaken, or harmful". ...
, the
Inquisition
The Inquisition was a group of institutions within the Catholic Church whose aim was to combat heresy, conducting trials of suspected heretics. Studies of the records have found that the overwhelming majority of sentences consisted of penances, ...
was a favorite target of attack for intellectuals.
British Empire
Great Britain
![Foxe's Book of Martyrs title page](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/48/Foxe%27s_Book_of_Martyrs_title_page.jpg)
Institutional anti-Catholicism in Britain and Ireland began with the
English Reformation
The English Reformation took place in 16th-century England when the Church of England broke away from the authority of the pope and the Catholic Church. These events were part of the wider European Protestant Reformation, a religious and poli ...
under
Henry VIII
Henry VIII (28 June 149128 January 1547) was King of England from 22 April 1509 until his death in 1547. Henry is best known for his six marriages, and for his efforts to have his first marriage (to Catherine of Aragon) annulled. His disa ...
. The
Act of Supremacy of 1534 declared the
English crown
This list of kings and reigning queens of the Kingdom of England begins with Alfred the Great, who initially ruled Wessex, one of the seven Anglo-Saxon kingdoms which later made up modern England. Alfred styled himself King of the Anglo-Sax ...
to be "the only supreme head on earth of the Church in England" in place of the pope. Any act of allegiance to the latter was considered treasonous because the papacy claimed to have both spiritual and political power over its followers. It was under this act that saints
Thomas More and
John Fisher were executed and became martyrs for the Catholic faith.
Queen Mary, Henry's daughter, was a devout Catholic and during her five years as queen (1553–58) she tried to reverse the Reformation. She married the Catholic king of Spain and executed Protestant leaders. Protestants reviled her as "Bloody Mary".
![ProtestantTutor](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2c/ProtestantTutor.png)
Anti-Catholicism among many of the English was not only grounded in their fear that the pope sought to reimpose religio-spiritual authority over England, it was also grounded in their fear that the pope also sought to impose secular power over them in alliance with their arch-enemies France and Spain. In 1570,
Pope Pius V
Pope Pius V ( it, Pio V; 17 January 1504 – 1 May 1572), born Antonio Ghislieri (from 1518 called Michele Ghislieri, O.P.), was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 8 January 1566 to his death in May 1572. He is v ...
sought to depose Elizabeth with the
papal bull ''
Regnans in Excelsis'', which declared that she was a heretic and purportedly dissolved the duty of all of Elizabeth's subjects to maintain their allegiance to her. This rendered Elizabeth's subjects who persisted in their allegiance to the Catholic Church politically suspect, and it also made the position of her Catholic subjects largely untenable if they tried to maintain both allegiances at once. The
Recusancy Acts, which made worship in the Anglican Church a legal obligation, date back to Elizabeth's reign.
Assassination plots in which Catholics were prime movers fueled anti-Catholicism in England. These plots included the famous
Gunpowder Plot, in which
Guy Fawkes and other conspirators plotted to blow up the English Parliament while it was in session. The fictitious "
Popish Plot
The Popish Plot was a fictitious conspiracy invented by Titus Oates that between 1678 and 1681 gripped the Kingdoms of England and Scotland in anti-Catholic hysteria. Oates alleged that there was an extensive Catholic conspiracy to assassinate C ...
" involving
Titus Oates was a hoax that many Protestants believed to be true, exacerbating Anglican-Catholic relations.
The
Glorious Revolution
The Glorious Revolution; gd, Rèabhlaid Ghlòrmhor; cy, Chwyldro Gogoneddus , also known as the ''Glorieuze Overtocht'' or ''Glorious Crossing'' in the Netherlands, is the sequence of events leading to the deposition of King James II and ...
of 1688–1689 involved the overthrow of King James II, of the Stuart dynasty, who favoured the Catholics, and his replacement by a Dutch Protestant. For decades the Stuarts were supported by France in plots to invade and conquer Britain, and anti-Catholicism persisted.
Gordon Riots 1780
The
Gordon Riots
The Gordon Riots of 1780 were several days of rioting in London motivated by anti-Catholic sentiment. They began with a large and orderly protest against the Papists Act 1778, which was intended to reduce official discrimination against British ...
of 1780 was a violent anti-Catholic riot in London against the
Papists Act of 1778. Passed by
Parliament
In modern politics, and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: Representation (politics), representing the Election#Suffrage, electorate, making laws, and overseeing ...
, the new law was supposed to reduce official discrimination against
British Catholics
The Catholic Church in the United Kingdom is part of the worldwide Catholic Church in communion with the Pope. While there is no ecclesiastical jurisdiction corresponding to the political union, this article refers to the Catholic Church's ge ...
.
Lord George Gordon, head of the Protestant Association, warned that the law would enable Catholics who were serving in the
British Army
The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gurk ...
to become a dangerous threat. The protest evolved into
riot
A riot is a form of civil disorder commonly characterized by a group lashing out in a violent public disturbance against authority, property, or people.
Riots typically involve destruction of property, public or private. The property targete ...
s and widespread
looting
Looting is the act of stealing, or the taking of goods by force, typically in the midst of a military, political, or other social crisis, such as war, natural disasters (where law and civil enforcement are temporarily ineffective), or rioting. ...
. Local magistrates feared reprisals and as a result, they did not enforce the riot act. The riots were not suppressed until the Army moved in and dispersed the crowds by shooting them, killing hundreds of rioters. The violence lasted from 2 June to 9 June 1780. Public opinion, especially in middle-class and elite circles, repudiated anti-Catholicism and lower-class violence, and it also rallied behind the
government
A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a state.
In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive, and judiciary. Government is a ...
of
Lord North. Demands for the establishment of a police force in London were subsequently made.
19th century
Anglo-French conflicts during the
French Revolutionary
The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in November 1799. Many of its ideas are consider ...
and
Napoleonic Wars
The Napoleonic Wars (1803–1815) were a series of major global conflicts pitting the French Empire and its allies, led by Napoleon I, against a fluctuating array of European states formed into various coalitions. It produced a period of Fren ...
, which lasted from 1793 until 1815, saw the rise of anti-Catholicism as an underlying method to unify the Protestant populations of England, Scotland and Wales. Permeating through all
social classes, antagonism towards Catholicism became firmly enmeshed with British
national identity. As noted by English historian
Linda Colley
Dame Linda Jane Colley, (born 13 September 1949 in Chester, England) is an expert on British, imperial and global history from 1700. She is Shelby M. C. Davis 1958 Professor of History at Princeton University and a long-term fellow in history a ...
in her seminal work ''Britons: Forging of a Nation 1707–1837'', the "defensive unity brought on by war with a Catholic French '
other
Other often refers to:
* Other (philosophy), a concept in psychology and philosophy
Other or The Other may also refer to:
Film and television
* ''The Other'' (1913 film), a German silent film directed by Max Mack
* ''The Other'' (1930 film), a ...
' helped transform Great Britain from a new and largely artificial polity into a nation with a strong self-image rooted in Protestantism."
Catholics in Ireland gained the right to vote in the 1790s but they were politically inert for another three decades. Finally, they were mobilized by
Daniel O'Connell
Daniel O'Connell (I) ( ga, Dónall Ó Conaill; 6 August 1775 – 15 May 1847), hailed in his time as The Liberator, was the acknowledged political leader of Ireland's Roman Catholic majority in the first half of the 19th century. His mobilizat ...
into majorities in most of the Irish parliamentary districts. They could only elect, but Catholics could not be seated in parliament. The
Catholic emancipation
Catholic emancipation or Catholic relief was a process in the kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland, and later the combined United Kingdom in the late 18th century and early 19th century, that involved reducing and removing many of the restricti ...
issue became a major crisis. Previously anti-Catholic politicians led by the
Duke of Wellington
Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, (1 May 1769 – 14 September 1852) was an Anglo-Irish soldier and Tory statesman who was one of the leading military and political figures of 19th-century Britain, serving twice as prime minister of ...
and
Robert Peel
Sir Robert Peel, 2nd Baronet, (5 February 1788 – 2 July 1850) was a British Conservative statesman who served twice as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (1834–1835 and 1841–1846) simultaneously serving as Chancellor of the Exchequer ...
reversed themselves to prevent massive violence. All Catholics in Britain were "emancipated" in the
Roman Catholic Relief Act 1829. That is, they were freed from most of the penalties and restrictions they faced. Anti-Catholic attitudes continued, however.
Since 1945
Since
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, anti-Catholic feeling in England has abated somewhat. Ecumenical dialogue between Anglicans and Catholics culminated in the first meeting between an Archbishop of Canterbury and a Pope since the Reformation when Archbishop
Geoffrey Fisher
Geoffrey Francis Fisher, Baron Fisher of Lambeth, (5 May 1887 – 15 September 1972) was an English Anglican priest, and 99th Archbishop of Canterbury, serving from 1945 to 1961.
From a long line of parish priests, Fisher was educated at Marlb ...
visited Rome in 1960. Since then, the dialogue has continued through envoys and standing conferences. Meanwhile, both the nonconformist churches such as the Methodists, and the established Church of England, have dramatically declined in membership. Membership in the Catholic Church continues to grow in Britain, thanks to the immigration of Irish and more recently, the immigration of Polish workers.
[J.R.H. Moorman (1973) ''A History of the Church in England''. London, A&C Black: 457]
Conflict and rivalry between Catholicism and Protestantism since the 1920s, especially since the 1960s, has centered on
the Troubles
The Troubles ( ga, Na Trioblóidí) were an ethno-nationalist conflict in Northern Ireland that lasted about 30 years from the late 1960s to 1998. Also known internationally as the Northern Ireland conflict, it is sometimes described as an "i ...
in
Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label= Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is variously described as a country, province or region. Nort ...
.
Anti-Catholicism in Britain was long represented by the burning of an effigy of the Catholic conspirator Guy Fawkes during widespread celebrations of
Guy Fawkes Night
Guy Fawkes Night, also known as Guy Fawkes Day, Bonfire Night and Fireworks Night, is an annual commemoration observed on 5 November, primarily in Great Britain, involving bonfires and fireworks displays. Its history begins with the ev ...
every 5 November. However, this celebration has lost most of its anti-Catholic connotations. Only faint remnants of anti-Catholicism are found today.
Ireland
![MADDEN(1888) p111 PEEP-OF-DAY BOYS](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2d/MADDEN%281888%29_p111_PEEP-OF-DAY_BOYS.jpg)
As punishment for the
rebellion of 1641
The Irish Rebellion of 1641 ( ga, Éirí Amach 1641) was an uprising by Irish Catholics in the Kingdom of Ireland, who wanted an end to anti-Catholic discrimination, greater Irish self-governance, and to partially or fully reverse the plantation ...
, almost all of the lands which were owned by
Irish Catholics
Irish Catholics are an ethnoreligious group native to Ireland whose members are both Catholic and Irish. They have a large diaspora, which includes over 36 million American citizens and over 14 million British citizens (a quarter of the British ...
were confiscated and
given to Protestant settlers. Under the
Penal Laws, no Irish Catholic could sit in the
Parliament of Ireland
The Parliament of Ireland ( ga, Parlaimint na hÉireann) was the legislature of the Lordship of Ireland, and later the Kingdom of Ireland, from 1297 until 1800. It was modelled on the Parliament of England and from 1537 comprised two chamb ...
, even though some 90% of Ireland's population was native Irish Catholic when the first of these bans was introduced in 1691. Tensions between Irish Catholics and Protestants have been blamed for much of "
The Troubles
The Troubles ( ga, Na Trioblóidí) were an ethno-nationalist conflict in Northern Ireland that lasted about 30 years from the late 1960s to 1998. Also known internationally as the Northern Ireland conflict, it is sometimes described as an "i ...
", an ethno-nationalist conflict in
Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label= Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is variously described as a country, province or region. Nort ...
.
During the 18th century, the
Peep o' Day Boys
The Peep o' Day Boys was an agrarian Protestant association in 18th-century Ireland. Originally noted as being an agrarian society around 1779–80, from 1785 it became the Protestant component of the sectarian conflict that emerged in County Arm ...
, an agrarian association composed of Irish Protestants, engaged in numerous acts of anti-Catholic violence through
County Armagh
County Armagh (, named after its county town, Armagh) is one of the six counties of Northern Ireland and one of the traditional thirty-two counties of Ireland. Adjoined to the southern shore of Lough Neagh, the county covers an area of and ha ...
. These acts culminated in the
Armagh disturbances, a period of intense sectarian conflict during the 1780's and 1790's between the Peep o' Day Boys and the Catholic
Defenders. The Peep o' Day Boys would conduct early morning raids on Catholic homes to confiscate weapons, which Irish Catholics were forbidden from owning under the Penal Laws. This led to confrontations between them and the Defenders, which culminated in the
Battle of the Diamond
The Battle of the Diamond was a planned confrontation between the Catholic Defenders and the Protestant Peep o' Day Boys that took place on 21 September 1795 near Loughgall, County Armagh, Ireland. The Peep o' Day Boys were the victors, killing ...
, a confrontation which saw six killed and many more wounded. Though the
Orange Order
The Loyal Orange Institution, commonly known as the Orange Order, is an international Protestant fraternal order based in Northern Ireland and primarily associated with Ulster Protestants, particularly those of Ulster Scots heritage. It also ...
would denounce the actions of the Peep o' Day Boys, further anti-Catholic violence would continue to erupt in Ireland in the years leading up the
Irish Rebellion of 1798.
=Laws which restricted the rights of Irish Catholics
=
The
Great Famine of Ireland was exacerbated by the imposition of anti-Catholic laws. In the 17th and 18th centuries, the
penal laws prohibited Irish Catholics from either purchasing or leasing land, from voting, from holding political office, from living either within away from a corporate town, from obtaining an education, from entering a profession, and doing many of the other things which a person needed to do in order to succeed and prosper in society. The laws had largely been reformed by 1793, and in 1829, Irish Catholics could again sit in parliament following the
Act of Emancipation.
Northern Ireland
The state of
Northern Ireland
Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label= Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is variously described as a country, province or region. Nort ...
came into existence in 1921, following the
Government of Ireland Act 1920. Though Catholics were a majority on the island of Ireland, comprising 74% of the population in 1911, they were a third of the population in Northern Ireland.
In 1934,
Sir James Craig
James Craig, 1st Viscount Craigavon PC PC (NI) DL (8 January 1871 – 24 November 1940), was a leading Irish unionist and a key architect of Northern Ireland as a devolved region within the United Kingdom. During the Home Rule Crisis of 1912 ...
, the first
Prime Minister of Northern Ireland, said, "Since we took up office we have tried to be absolutely fair towards all the citizens of Northern Ireland... They still boast of
Southern Ireland
Southern Ireland, South Ireland or South of Ireland may refer to:
*The southern part of the island of Ireland
*Southern Ireland (1921–1922), a former constituent part of the United Kingdom
*Republic of Ireland, which is sometimes referred to as ...
being a Catholic State. All I boast of is that we are a Protestant Parliament and a Protestant State."
In 1957,
Harry Midgley
Henry Cassidy Midgley, PC (NI), known as Harry Midgley (1893 – 29 April 1957) was a prominent trade-unionist and politician in Northern Ireland. Born to a working-class Protestant family in Tiger's Bay, north Belfast, he followed his father into ...
, the
Minister of Education in Northern Ireland, said, in
Portadown Orange Hall, "All the minority are traitors and have always been traitors to the Government of Northern Ireland."
The first Catholic to be appointed a minister in Northern Ireland was
Dr Gerard Newe, in 1971.
In 1986, at the annual conference of the
Democratic Unionist Party
The Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) is a unionist, loyalist, and national conservative political party in Northern Ireland. It was founded in 1971 during the Troubles by Ian Paisley, who led the party for the next 37 years. Currently led by J ...
,
MP for Mid Ulster William McCrea interrupted councillor Ethel Smyth when she said she regretted the death of Sean Downes, a 24-year-old Catholic civilian who had been killed by a plastic bullet fired by the
RUC during an anti-internment march in
Andersontown
Andersontown is a populated place on Maryland's Eastern Shore in Caroline County, Maryland, United States. It is situated near the Delaware
Delaware ( ) is a state in the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States, bordering Maryland to i ...
in 1984. McCrea shouted, "No. No. I'll not condemn the death of John Downes
ic No Fenian. Never. No". In Northern Ireland and Scotland, ''Fenian'' is used by some as a derogatory word for Roman Catholics.
Canada
Fears of the Catholic Church were quite strong in the 19th century, especially among
Presbyterian
Presbyterianism is a part of the Reformed tradition within Protestantism that broke from the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland by John Knox, who was a priest at St. Giles Cathedral (Church of Scotland). Presbyterian churches derive their nam ...
and other Protestant Irish immigrants across Canada.
In 1853, the
Gavazzi Riots
The Gavazzi Riots were disturbances created in Quebec and Montreal in June 1853 by mobs which attacked halls in which ex-Catholic monk Alessandro Gavazzi was lecturing.
Overview
During the spring of 1853 Alessandro Gavazzi, an Italian patriot ...
left 10 dead in Quebec in the wake of Catholic Irish protests against anti-Catholic speeches by ex-monk
Alessandro Gavazzi
Alessandro Gavazzi (21 March 18099 January 1889) was an Italian preacher and patriot. He at first became a monk (1825), and attached himself to the Barnabites at Naples, where he afterwards (1829) acted as professor of rhetoric. He left the chur ...
. The most influential newspaper in Canada, ''
The Globe'' of Toronto, was edited by
George Brown George Brown may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* George Loring Brown (1814–1889), American landscape painter
* George Douglas Brown (1869–1902), Scottish novelist
* George Williams Brown (1894–1963), Canadian historian and editor
* G ...
, a Presbyterian immigrant from Ireland who ridiculed and denounced the Catholic Church,
Jesuits
The Society of Jesus ( la, Societas Iesu; abbreviation: SJ), also known as the Jesuits (; la, Iesuitæ), is a religious order (Catholic), religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rom ...
, priests, nunneries, etc. Irish Protestants remained a political force until the 20th century. Many belonged to the
Orange Order
The Loyal Orange Institution, commonly known as the Orange Order, is an international Protestant fraternal order based in Northern Ireland and primarily associated with Ulster Protestants, particularly those of Ulster Scots heritage. It also ...
,
an anti-Catholic organization with chapters across Canada that was most powerful during the late 19th century.
A key leader was
Dalton McCarthy
Dalton McCarthy (October 10, 1836 – May 11, 1898), or D'Alton McCarthy, was a Canadian lawyer and parliamentarian. He was the leader of the "Orange" or Protestant Irish, and fiercely fought against Irish Catholics as well as the French C ...
(1836–1898), a Protestant who had immigrated from Ireland. In the late 19th century he mobilized the "Orange" or Protestant Irish, and fiercely fought against Irish Catholics as well as the French Catholics. He especially crusaded for the abolition of the French language in Manitoba and Ontario schools.
In response to the
2021 Canadian Indian residential school gravesite discoveries, numerous churches and monuments in Western Canada have been vandalized or burned down.
French language schools in Canada
One of the most controversial issues was public support for Catholic French-language schools. Although the Confederation Agreement of 1867 guaranteed the status of Catholic schools when they were legalized by provincial governments, disputes erupted in numerous provinces, especially in the
Manitoba Schools Question in the 1890s and in Ontario in the 1910s. In Ontario,
Regulation 17
Regulation 17 (french: Règlement 17) was a regulation of the Government of Ontario, Canada, designed to limit instruction in French-language Catholic separate schools. The regulation was written by the Ministry of Education and was issued in July ...
was a regulation by the Ontario Ministry of Education that restricted the use of French as a language of instruction to the first two years of schooling. French Canada reacted vehemently and lost, dooming its French-language Catholic schools. This was a central reason for French Canada's distance from the
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 fightin ...
effort, as its young men refused to enlist.
Protestant elements succeeded in blocking the growth of French-language Catholic public schools. However, the Irish Catholics generally supported the English language position which was advocated by the Protestants.
Newfoundland
Newfoundland
Newfoundland and Labrador (; french: Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador; frequently abbreviated as NL) is the easternmost province of Canada, in the country's Atlantic region. The province comprises the island of Newfoundland and the continental region ...
long experienced social and political tensions between the large Irish Catholic working-class, on the one hand and the Anglican elite on the other. In the 1850s, the Catholic bishop organized his flock and made them stalwarts of the Liberal party. Nasty rhetoric was the prevailing style elections; bloody riots were common during the 1861 election. The Protestants narrowly elected
Hugh Hoyles
Sir Hugh Hoyles (October 17, 1814 – February 1, 1888) was a politician and lawyer who served as the third premier of the colony of Newfoundland. Hoyles was the first premier of Newfoundland to have been born in the colony, and served from 1 ...
as the Conservative Prime Minister. Hoyles unexpectedly reversed his long record of militant Protestant activism and worked to defuse tensions. He shared patronage and power with the Catholics; all jobs and patronage were split between the various religious bodies on a per capita basis. This 'denominational compromise' was further extended to education when all religious schools were put on the basis which the Catholics had enjoyed since the 1840s. Alone in North America Newfoundland had a state funded system of denominational schools. The compromise worked and politics ceased to be about religion and became concerned with purely political and economic issues.
Australia
The presence of
Catholicism in Australia
The Catholic Church in Australia is part of the worldwide Catholic Church under the spiritual and administrative leadership of the Holy See. From origins as a suppressed, mainly Irish minority in early colonial times, the church has grown ...
came with the 1788 arrival of the
First Fleet
The First Fleet was a fleet of 11 ships that brought the first European and African settlers to Australia. It was made up of two Royal Navy vessels, three store ships and six convict transports. On 13 May 1787 the fleet under the command ...
of British convict ships at Sydney. The colonial authorities blocked a Catholic clerical presence until 1820, reflecting the legal disabilities of Catholics in Britain. Some of the Irish convicts had been transported to Australia for political crimes or social rebellion and authorities remained suspicious of the minority religion.
Catholic convicts were compelled to attend Church of England services and their children and orphans were raised as Anglicans.
The first Catholic priests to arrive came as convicts following the Irish
1798 Rebellion
The Irish Rebellion of 1798 ( ga, Éirí Amach 1798; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ''The Hurries'') was a major uprising against British rule in Ireland. The main organising force was the Society of United Irishmen, a Irish republicanism, ...
. In 1803, one Fr Dixon was conditionally emancipated and permitted to celebrate Mass, but following the Irish led
Castle Hill Rebellion
The Castle Hill convict rebellion was an 1804 Convicts in Australia, convict rebellion in the Castle Hill, New South Wales, Castle Hill area of Sydney, against the colonial authorities of the British Empire, British colony of Colony of New South ...
of 1804, Dixon's permission was revoked. Fr
Jeremiah Flynn
Jeremiah, Modern: , Tiberian: ; el, Ἰερεμίας, Ieremíās; meaning " Yah shall raise" (c. 650 – c. 570 BC), also called Jeremias or the "weeping prophet", was one of the major prophets of the Hebrew Bible. According to Jewish ...
, an Irish
Cistercian
The Cistercians, () officially the Order of Cistercians ( la, (Sacer) Ordo Cisterciensis, abbreviated as OCist or SOCist), are a Catholic religious order of monks and nuns that branched off from the Benedictines and follow the Rule of Saint ...
, was appointed as
Prefect Apostolic
An apostolic prefect or prefect apostolic is a priest who heads what is known as an apostolic prefecture, a 'pre-diocesan' missionary jurisdiction where the Catholic Church is not yet sufficiently developed to have it made a diocese. Although it ...
of
New Holland and set out uninvited from Britain for the colony. Watched by authorities, Flynn secretly performed priestly duties before being arrested and deported to London. Reaction to the affair in Britain led to two further priests being allowed to travel to the colony in 1820.
The
Church of England
The Church of England (C of E) is the established Christian church in England and the mother church of the international Anglican Communion. It traces its history to the Christian church recorded as existing in the Roman province of Britain ...
was disestablished in the Colony of New South Wales by the ''Church Act of 1836''. Drafted by the Catholic attorney-general
John Plunkett, the act established legal equality for Anglicans, Catholics and Presbyterians and was later extended to Methodists.
By the late 19th century approximately a quarter of the population of Australia were
Irish Australians
Irish Australians ( ga, Gael-Astrálaigh) are an ethnic group of Australians, Australian citizens of Irish descent, which include immigrants from and descendants whose ancestry originates from the Ireland, island of Ireland.
Irish Australians ...
. Many were descended from the 40,000 Irish Catholics who were transported as convicts to Australia before 1867. The majority consisted of British and Irish Protestants. The Catholics dominated the labour unions and the Labor Party. The growth of school systems in the late 19th century typically involved religious issues, pitting Protestants against Catholics. The issue of independence for Ireland was long a sore point, until the matter was resolved by the
Irish War of Independence
The Irish War of Independence () or Anglo-Irish War was a guerrilla war fought in Ireland from 1919 to 1921 between the Irish Republican Army (IRA, the army of the Irish Republic) and British forces: the British Army, along with the quasi-mil ...
.
Limited freedom of belief is protected by
Section 116 of the Constitution of Australia, but
sectarianism in Australia
Sectarianism in Australia is a historical legacy from the eighteenth, nineteenth and twentieth centuries, when Australia was a sectarian society divided between Catholics – predominantly but not exclusively of Irish background – on t ...
was prominent (though generally nonviolent) in the 20th century, flaring during the
First World War
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 fightin ...
, again reflecting Ireland's place within the Empire, and the Catholic minority remained subject to discrimination and suspicion. During the First World War, the Irish gave support for the war effort and comprised 20% of the army in France. However, the labour unions and the Irish in particular, strongly opposed conscription, and in alliance with like-minded farmers, defeated it in national plebiscites in
1916
Events
Below, the events of the First World War have the "WWI" prefix.
January
* January 1 – The British Royal Army Medical Corps carries out the first successful blood transfusion, using blood that had been stored and cooled.
* ...
and
1917
Events
Below, the events of World War I have the "WWI" prefix.
January
* January 9 – WWI – Battle of Rafa: The last substantial Ottoman Army garrison on the Sinai Peninsula is captured by the Egyptian Expeditionary Force's ...
. The Anglicans in particular talked of Catholic "disloyalty". By the 1920s, Australia had its
first Catholic prime minister.
During the 1950s, the split in the Australian Labor Party between allies and opponents of the Catholic anti-Communist
B.A. Santamaria meant that the party (in Victoria and Queensland more than elsewhere) was effectively divided between pro-Catholic and anti-Catholic elements. As a result of such disunity the ALP was defeated at every single national election between 1955 and 1972. In the late 20th century, the Catholic Church replaced the Anglican Church as the largest single
Christian body in Australia; and it continues to be so in the 21st century, although it still has fewer members than do the various Protestant churches combined.
While older sectarian divides declined, commentators have observed a re-emergence of anti-Catholicism in Australia in recent decades amid rising secularism and broader
anti-Christian movements.
New Zealand
According to
New Zealand
New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...
historian
A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the stu ...
Michael King, the situation in New Zealand has never been as clear as in Australia.
Catholics
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
first arrived in New Zealand in 1769, and the Church has had a continuous presence in the country from the time of permanent settlement by
Irish Catholics
Irish Catholics are an ethnoreligious group native to Ireland whose members are both Catholic and Irish. They have a large diaspora, which includes over 36 million American citizens and over 14 million British citizens (a quarter of the British ...
in the 1820s, with the first Maori converted to Catholicism in the 1830s. The signing of the
Treaty of Waitangi in 1840, which formalised New Zealand's status as a British colony and instigated substantial immigration from
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
and
Scotland
Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...
, resulted in the country developing a predominantly
Protestant
Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...
religious character. Nonetheless,
French
French (french: français(e), link=no) may refer to:
* Something of, from, or related to France
** French language, which originated in France, and its various dialects and accents
** French people, a nation and ethnic group identified with Franc ...
bishop
A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution.
In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is ca ...
Jean Baptiste Pompallier
Jean-Baptiste François Pompallier (11 December 1801 – 21 December 1871) was the first Roman Catholic bishop in New Zealand and, with priests and brothers of the Marist order, he organised the Roman Catholic Church throughout the country. ...
was able to negotiate the inclusion of a clause guaranteeing
freedom of religion
Freedom of religion or religious liberty is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or community, in public or private, to manifest religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship, and observance. It also includes the freedom ...
in some of the versions of the treaties signed and oral promises during meetings beforehand.
New Zealand has had several Catholic
prime ministers, which is indicative of the widespread acceptance of Catholicism within the country;
Jim Bolger, who lead the
Fourth National Government of the 1990s, was the country's fourth Catholic prime minister;
Bill English, who lead the
Fifth National Government
Neville Chamberlain formed the Chamberlain war ministry in 1939 after declaring war on Germany. Chamberlain led the country for the first eight months of the Second World War, until the Norway Debate in Parliament led Chamberlain to resign a ...
from 2016 to 2017, was the fifth and most recent. Probably the most notable of New Zealand's Catholic prime ministers was
Michael Joseph Savage, an
Australian-born
trade unionist
A trade union (labor union in American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers intent on "maintaining or improving the conditions of their employment", ch. I such as attaining better wages and Employee ben ...
and
social reformer who instigated numerous progressive policies as leader of the
First Labour Government
The first MacDonald ministry of the United Kingdom lasted from January to November 1924. The Labour Party, under Ramsay MacDonald, had failed to win the general election of December 1923, with 191 seats, although the combined Opposition tall ...
of the 1930s.
German Empire
![Kladderadatsch 1875 - Zwischen Berlin und Rom](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/81/Kladderadatsch_1875_-_Zwischen_Berlin_und_Rom.png)
Unification into the German Empire in 1871 saw a country with a Protestant majority and large Catholic minority, speaking German or Polish. Anti-Catholicism was common. The powerful German Chancellor
Otto von Bismarck
Otto, Prince of Bismarck, Count of Bismarck-Schönhausen, Duke of Lauenburg (, ; 1 April 1815 – 30 July 1898), born Otto Eduard Leopold von Bismarck, was a conservative German statesman and diplomat. From his origins in the upper class of J ...
a devout Lutheranforged an alliance with secular liberals in 1871–1878 to launch a
Kulturkampf
(, 'culture struggle') was the conflict that took place from 1872 to 1878 between the Catholic Church led by Pope Pius IX and the government of Prussia led by Otto von Bismarck. The main issues were clerical control of education and ecclesiastic ...
(literally, "culture struggle") especially in Prussia, the largest state in the new German Empire to destroy the political power of the Catholic Church and the Pope. Catholics were numerous in the South (Bavaria, Baden-Wuerttemberg) and west (Rhineland) and fought back. Bismarck intended to end Catholics' loyalty with Rome (
ultramontanism
Ultramontanism is a clerical political conception within the Catholic Church that places strong emphasis on the prerogatives and powers of the Pope. It contrasts with Gallicanism, the belief that popular civil authority—often represented by th ...
) and subordinate all Germans to the power of his state.
Priests and bishops who resisted the Kulturkampf were arrested or removed from their positions. By the height of anti-Catholic legislation, half of the Prussian bishops were in prison or in exile, a quarter of the parishes had no priest, half the monks and nuns had left Prussia, a third of the monasteries and convents were closed, 1800 parish priests were imprisoned or exiled, and thousands of laymen were imprisoned for helping the priests. There were anti-Polish elements in Greater Poland and Silesia.
[ ] The Catholics refused to comply; they strengthened their Centre Party.
Pius IX died in 1878 and was replaced by more conciliatory
Pope Leo XIII
Pope Leo XIII ( it, Leone XIII; born Vincenzo Gioacchino Raffaele Luigi Pecci; 2 March 1810 – 20 July 1903) was the head of the Catholic Church from 20 February 1878 to his death in July 1903. Living until the age of 93, he was the second-old ...
who negotiated away most of the anti-Catholic laws beginning in 1880. Bismark himself broke with the anti-Catholic Liberals and worked with the Catholic Centre Party to fight Socialism. Pope Leo officially declared the end of the Kulturkampf on 23 May 1887.
Nazi Germany
The Catholic Church faced repression in
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
(1933–1945).
Hitler
Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Germany from 1933 until his death in 1945. He rose to power as the leader of the Nazi Party, becoming the chancellor in 1933 and then ...
despised the Church even though he had been brought up in a Catholic home. The long-term aim of many Nazis was the de-Christianization of Germany and the establishment of a form of
Germanic paganism which would replace Christianity.
[Sharkey]
Word for Word/The Case Against the Nazis; How Hitler's Forces Planned To Destroy German Christianity
New York Times, 13 January 2002[Bendersky, Joseph W.]
A concise history of Nazi Germany
p. 147, Rowman & Littlefield, 2007: "Consequently, it was Hitler’s long range goal to eliminate the churches once he had consolidated control over his European empire." however
Richard J. Evans
Sir Richard John Evans (born 29 September 1947) is a British historian of 19th- and 20th-century Europe with a focus on Germany. He is the author of eighteen books, including his three-volume ''The Third Reich Trilogy'' (2003–2008). Evans was ...
writes that Hitler believed that in the long run National Socialism and religion would not be able to co-exist, stressing repeatedly that Nazism was a secular ideology, founded on modern science: "Science, he declared, would easily destroy the last remaining vestiges of superstition". Germany could not tolerate the intervention of foreign influences such as the Pope and "Priests, he said, were 'black bugs', 'abortions in black cassocks.
Nazi ideology desired the subordination of the Church to the State and could not accept an autonomous establishment, whose legitimacy did not spring from the government. From the beginning, the Catholic Church faced general persecution, regimentation and oppression. Aggressive anti-Church radicals like
Alfred Rosenberg and
Martin Bormann
Martin Ludwig Bormann (17 June 1900 – 2 May 1945) was a German Nazi Party official and head of the Nazi Party Chancellery. He gained immense power by using his position as Adolf Hitler's private secretary to control the flow of information ...
saw the conflict with the Churches as a priority concern, and anti-Church and
anti-clerical sentiments were strong among grassroots party activists.
[Ian Kershaw; Hitler a Biography; 2008 Edn; WW Norton & Company; London; pp. 381–382.
] To many Nazis, Catholics were suspected of insufficient patriotism, or even of disloyalty to the Fatherland, and of serving the interests of "sinister alien forces".
Adolf Hitler had some regard for the organisational power of Catholicism, but towards its teachings he showed nothing but the sharpest hostility, calling them "the systematic cultivation of the human failure": To Hitler,
Christianity
Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. It is the world's largest and most widespread religion with roughly 2.38 billion followers representing one-third of the global pop ...
was a religion that was only fit for slaves and he detested its ethics.
Alan Bullock wrote: "Its teaching, he declared, was a rebellion against the
natural law of selection by struggle and the
survival of the fittest
"Survival of the fittest" is a phrase that originated from Darwinian evolutionary theory as a way of describing the mechanism of natural selection. The biological concept of fitness is defined as reproductive success. In Darwinian terms, th ...
". For political reasons, Hitler was prepared to restrain his anti-clericalism, seeing danger in strengthening the Church by persecuting it, but he intended to wage a show-down against it after the war.
[ Alan Bullock. '' Hitler: A Study in Tyranny''; HarperPerennial Edition 1991; p. 219.] Joseph Goebbels, the Minister for Propaganda, led the Nazi persecution of the Catholic clergy and wrote that there was "an insoluble opposition between the Christian and a heroic-German world view".
Hitler's chosen deputy, Martin Bormann, was a rigid guardian of Nazi orthodoxy and saw Christianity and Nazism as "incompatible", as did the official Nazi philosopher,
Alfred Rosenberg, who wrote in ''
Myth of the Twentieth Century
''The Myth of the Twentieth Century'' (german: Der Mythus des zwanzigsten Jahrhunderts) is a 1930 book by Alfred Rosenberg, one of the principal ideologues of the Nazi Party and editor of the Nazi paper ''Völkischer Beobachter''. The titular " ...
'' (1930) that the Catholic Church were among the chief enemies of the Germans.
[Encyclopædia Britannica Online: ''Fascism - Identification with Christianity''; 2013. Web. 14 April 2013] In 1934, the ''
Sanctum Officium'' put Rosenberg's book on the ''
Index Librorum Prohibitorum
The ''Index Librorum Prohibitorum'' ("List of Prohibited Books") was a list of publications deemed heretical or contrary to morality by the Sacred Congregation of the Index (a former Dicastery of the Roman Curia), and Catholics were forbidden ...
'' (forbidden books list of the Church) for scorning and rejecting "all dogmas of the Catholic Church, indeed the very fundamentals of the Christian religion".
The Nazis claimed that they had jurisdiction over all collective and social activities and based on their claim, they infiltrated all collective and social institutions, interfered in all of the activities which they performed, and banned them if they did not become Nazified, including Catholic schools, youth groups, workers' clubs and cultural societies. Hitler moved quickly to eliminate
Political Catholicism, rounding up members of the Catholic aligned
Bavarian People's Party and
Catholic Centre Party
The Centre Party (german: Zentrum), officially the German Centre Party (german: link=no, Deutsche Zentrumspartei) and also known in English as the Catholic Centre Party, is a Catholic political party in Germany, influential in the German Empire ...
, which ceased to exist in early July 1933. Vice Chancellor Papen meanwhile, amid continuing molestation of Catholic clergy and organisations, negotiated a
Reich concordat
The ''Reichskonkordat'' ("Concordat between the Holy See and the German Reich") is a treaty negotiated between the Vatican and the emergent Nazi Germany. It was signed on 20 July 1933 by Cardinal Secretary of State Eugenio Pacelli, who later b ...
with the Holy See, which prohibited clergy from participating in politics. Hitler then proceeded to close all Catholic institutions whose functions were not strictly religious:
Almost immediately after agreeing the Concordat, the Nazis promulgated their sterilization law, an offensive policy in the eyes of the Catholic Church and moved to dissolve the Catholic Youth League. Clergy, nuns and lay leaders began to be targeted, leading to thousands of arrests over the ensuing years, often on trumped up charges of currency smuggling or "immorality".
[William L. Shirer; The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich; Secker & Warburg; London; 1960; pp. 234–235.] In Hitler's
Night of the Long Knives purge,
Erich Klausener, the head of
Catholic Action
Catholic Action is the name of groups of lay Catholics who advocate for increased Catholic influence on society. They were especially active in the nineteenth century in historically Catholic countries under anti-clerical regimes such as Spain, Ita ...
, was assassinated.
[Ian Kershaw; Hitler a Biography; 2008 Edn; WW Norton & Company; London; p. 315] Adalbert Probst
Adalbert Probst (1900 - 1934) was a Catholic Youth leader in Germany during Nazi period. He was killed during Hitler's 1934 Night of the Long Knives purge. Probst was national director of the Catholic Youth Sports Association. The Catholic Church ...
, national director of the Catholic Youth Sports Association,
Fritz Gerlich
Carl Albert Fritz Michael Gerlich (15 February 1883 – 30 June 1934) was a German journalist and historian, and one of the main journalistic resistors of Adolf Hitler. He was arrested, later killed and cremated at the Dachau concentration camp. ...
, editor of Munich's Catholic weekly and
Edgar Jung, one of the authors of the
Marburg speech, were among the other Catholic opposition figures killed in the purge.
By 1937, the Church hierarchy in Germany, which had initially attempted to co-operate with the new government, had become highly disillusioned. In March,
Pope Pius XI
Pope Pius XI ( it, Pio XI), born Ambrogio Damiano Achille Ratti (; 31 May 1857 – 10 February 1939), was head of the Catholic Church from 6 February 1922 to his death in February 1939. He was the first sovereign of Vatican City fro ...
issued the ''
Mit brennender Sorge'' encyclicalaccusing the Nazis of violations of the Concordat, and of sowing the "tares of suspicion, discord, hatred, calumny, of secret and open fundamental hostility to Christ and His Church". The Pope noted on the horizon the "threatening storm clouds" of religious wars of extermination over Germany.
The Nazis responded with, an intensification of the
Church Struggle.
There were mass arrests of clergy and Church presses were expropriated. Goebbels renewed the regime's crackdown and propaganda against Catholics. By 1939 all Catholic denominational schools had been disbanded or converted to public facilities. By 1941, all Church press had been banned.
Later Catholic protests included the 22 March 1942 pastoral letter by the German bishops on "The Struggle against Christianity and the Church". About 30 per cent of Catholic priests were disciplined by police during the Nazi era. In effort to counter the strength and influence of spiritual resistance, the security services monitored Catholic clergy very closelyinstructing that agents monitor every diocese, that the bishops' reports to the Vatican should be obtained and that bishops' activities be discovered and reported. Priests were frequently denounced, arrested, or sent to concentration campsmany to the dedicated
clergy barracks at Dachau. Of a total of 2,720 clergy imprisoned at Dachau, some 2,579 (or 95%) were Catholic.
[Paul Berben; ''Dachau: The Official History 1933–1945''; Norfolk Press; London; 1975; ; pp. 276–277] Nazi policy towards the Church was at its most severe in the territories it annexed to Greater Germany, where the Nazis set about systematically dismantling the Churcharresting its leaders, exiling its clergymen, closing its churches, monasteries and convents. Many clergymen were murdered.
Netherlands
The independence of the
Netherlands
)
, anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau")
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, subdivision_type = Sovereign state
, subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands
, established_title = Before independence
, established_date = Spanish Netherl ...
from
Spanish rule led to the formation of a majority Protestant country in which the dominant form of Protestantism was
Calvinism
Calvinism (also called the Reformed Tradition, Reformed Protestantism, Reformed Christianity, or simply Reformed) is a major branch of Protestantism that follows the theological tradition and forms of Christian practice set down by John Cal ...
. In
Amsterdam
Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the Capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population ...
, Catholic priests were driven out of the city
and following the Dutch takeover, all Catholic churches were converted into Protestant churches.
Amsterdam's relationship with the Catholic Church was not normalized until the 20th century.
Nordic countries
Norway
After the
dissolution of Denmark-Norway in 1814, the new
Norwegian Constitution of 1814, did not grant
religious freedom
Freedom of religion or religious liberty is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or community, in public or private, to manifest religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship, and observance. It also includes the freedom ...
, as it stated that both
Jews
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...
and
Jesuits
The Society of Jesus ( la, Societas Iesu; abbreviation: SJ), also known as the Jesuits (; la, Iesuitæ), is a religious order (Catholic), religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rom ...
were denied entrance to the
Kingdom of Norway. It also stated that attendance in a
Lutheran
Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Catholic Church launched th ...
church was compulsory, effectively banning Catholics. The ban on Catholicism was lifted in
1842
Events
January–March
* January
** Michael Alexander takes office, as the first appointee to the Anglican-German Bishopric in Jerusalem.
** American medical student William E. Clarke of Berkshire Medical College becomes the first pe ...
, and the ban on Jews was lifted in
1851
Events
January–March
* January 11 – Hong Xiuquan officially begins the Taiping Rebellion.
* January 15 – Christian Female College, modern-day Columbia College, receives its charter from the Missouri General Assembly.
...
. At first, there were multiple restrictions on the practice of Catholicism by Norwegians and only foreign citizens were freely allowed to practice it. The first post-reformation parish was founded in
1843
Events January–March
* January
** Serial publication of Charles Dickens's novel ''Martin Chuzzlewit'' begins in London; in the July chapters, he lands his hero in the United States.
** Edgar Allan Poe's short story "The Tell-Tale Heart" ...
, Catholics were only allowed to celebrate Mass in this one parish. In
1845
Events
January–March
* January 10 – Elizabeth Barrett receives a love letter from the younger poet Robert Browning; on May 20, they meet for the first time in London. She begins writing her ''Sonnets from the Portuguese''.
* January 23 ...
most of the restrictions on the practice of non-Lutheran Christianity were lifted, and Catholics were now allowed to freely practice their religion, but
Monasticism
Monasticism (from Ancient Greek , , from , , 'alone'), also referred to as monachism, or monkhood, is a religious way of life in which one renounces worldly pursuits to devote oneself fully to spiritual work. Monastic life plays an important role ...
and the Jesuits were not allowed in the country until
1897
Events
January–March
* January 2 – The International Alpha Omicron Pi sorority is founded, in New York City.
* January 4 – A British force is ambushed by Chief Ologbosere, son-in-law of the ruler. This leads to a puniti ...
and
1956
Events
January
* January 1 – The Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, Anglo-Egyptian Condominium ends in Sudan.
* January 8 – Operation Auca: Five U.S. evangelical Christian Missionary, missionaries, Nate Saint, Roger Youderian, Ed McCully, Jim ...
respectively.
Swedish Empire
During the period of great power in
Sweden
Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...
, conversions to Catholicism were punished with fines or imprisonment and in exceptional cases, death. Sweden during the
Thirty Years War
The Thirty Years' War was one of the longest and List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, most destructive conflicts in History of Europe, European history, lasting from 1618 to 1648. Fought primarily in Central Europe, an es ...
saw itself as the protector of Protestantism in all of Europe against the pope. The
Linköping Bloodbath
The Linköping Bloodbath ( sv, Linköpings blodbad) on 20 March 1600 was the public execution by beheading of five Swedish nobles in the aftermath of the War against Sigismund (1598–1599), which resulted in the ''de facto'' deposition of the ...
of 20 March 1600 saw several prominent Catholic nobles beheaded by order of King
Charles IX of Sweden
Charles IX, also Carl ( sv, Karl IX; 4 October 1550 – 30 October 1611), reigned as King of Sweden from 1604 until his death. He was the youngest son of King Gustav I () and of his second wife, Margaret Leijonhufvud, the brother of King Eric X ...
. The executions were partially motivated by the Polish invasion of Sweden and a threat of a potential Catholic takeover under Polish king
Sigismund III Vasa, who planned to reconvert Sweden back to Catholicism. The
Battle of Stångebro
The Battle of Stångebro, or the Battle of Linköping, took place at Linköping, Sweden, on 25 September 1598 (O.S.) and effectively ended the personal union between Sweden and the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, that had existed since 1592. ...
prevented Sigismund from conquering and reconverting Sweden. Catholic nobles were put in a majority of leading positions by Sigismund In the Swedish government without the approval of the Swedish people or parliament. The conspiracy provoked new laws preventing Catholics from holding leading government positions in the Swedish government. Due to the Austrian emperor winning a lot of great victories before Sweden joined. The war and Swedish successes cemented Protestantism's continued survival in the
Holy Roman Empire
The Holy Roman Empire was a Polity, political entity in Western Europe, Western, Central Europe, Central, and Southern Europe that developed during the Early Middle Ages and continued until its Dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire, dissolution i ...
and the following anti-Catholicism ingrained in the religion.
Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden
Gustavus Adolphus (9 December Old_Style_and_New_Style_dates">N.S_19_December.html" ;"title="Old_Style_and_New_Style_dates.html" ;"title="/nowiki>Old Style and New Style dates">N.S 19 December">Old_Style_and_New_Style_dates.html" ;"title="/now ...
was known as the "Lion from the North". He did prevent the pillaging of Catholic villages of Swedish troops by proclaiming Protestant moral superiority in 1631, while Catholic armies were plundering Saxony. He did not wear any armour during the
Battle of Rain against the Catholics and proclaimed he was divinely chosen by God to lead the Protestants to glory, and so felt he needed no protection in battle.
Russian Orthodox populations had the right to practice their faith since their incorporation in 1617 after the
Ingrian War and never faced similar persecution. Even after Eastern Orthodoxy was legalized, there remained an extreme anti-Catholic sentiment in Sweden which was widely supported by German nobility and German Protestants in Swedish territories.
Only in 1781 did Catholics have the right to worship once again in Sweden, the latest of all major religions except
Judaism
Judaism ( he, ''Yahăḏūṯ'') is an Abrahamic, monotheistic, and ethnic religion comprising the collective religious, cultural, and legal tradition and civilization of the Jewish people. It has its roots as an organized religion in the ...
that was legalized in the same era, even though Judaism had already been in practice tolerated since
Charles XII of Sweden
Charles XII, sometimes Carl XII ( sv, Karl XII) or Carolus Rex (17 June 1682 – 30 November 1718 O.S.), was King of Sweden (including current Finland) from 1697 to 1718. He belonged to the House of Palatinate-Zweibrücken, a branch line of t ...
brought Muslim and Jewish advisors with him from the Ottoman Empire. While Protestant Swedes could not join any other religious organization until 1873, still, in 1849, Catholic converts were punished with imprisonment. Conversion to Catholicism was punished with fines or imprisonment even after the reform. Catholics could not become a minister of the Swedish government or work as teachers or nurses in Sweden until 1951.
United States
John Higham John Higham is the name of
* John Higham (Australian politician) (1856–1927), Western Australian Legislative Assembly Member
* John Higham (historian) (1920–2003), American historian
* John Sharp Higham
John Sharp Higham (14 June 1857 – 5 ...
described anti-Catholicism as "the most luxuriant, tenacious tradition of paranoiac agitation in
American history
The history of the lands that became the United States began with the arrival of the first people in the Americas around 15,000 BC. Numerous indigenous cultures formed, and many saw transformations in the 16th century away from more densely ...
."
* Jenkins, Philip. ''
The New Anti-Catholicism: The Last Acceptable Prejudice'' (Oxford University Press, New ed. 2004). British anti-Catholicism was exported to the United States. Two types of anti-Catholic rhetoric existed in colonial society. The first, which was derived from the heritage of the
Protestant Reformation
The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...
and the
religious wars of the sixteenth century, consisted of the "Anti-Christ" and the "Whore of Babylon" variety and it dominated Anti-Catholic thought until the late seventeenth century. The second was a more secular variety which focused on the supposed intrigue of the Catholics and accused them of plotting to extend
medieval despotism worldwide.
Historian
Arthur Schlesinger Sr.
Arthur Meier Schlesinger Sr. (; February 27, 1888 – October 30, 1965) was an American historian who taught at Harvard University, pioneering social history and urban history. He was a Progressive Era intellectual who stressed material caus ...
has called anti-Catholicism "the deepest-held bias in the history of the American people".
Historian Joseph G. Mannard says that wars reduced anti-Catholicism: "enough Catholics supported the War for Independence to erase many old myths about the inherently treasonable nature of Catholicism.... During the Civil War the heavy enlistments of Irish and Germans into the Union Army helped to dispel notions of immigrant and Catholic disloyalty."
[
]
Colonial era
American anti-Catholicism has its origins in the Protestant Reformation which generated anti-Catholic propaganda for various political and dynastic reasons. Because the Protestant Reformation justified itself as an effort to correct what it perceived were the errors and the excesses of the Catholic Church, it formed strong positions against the Catholic bishops and the Papacy
The pope ( la, papa, from el, πάππας, translit=pappas, 'father'), also known as supreme pontiff ( or ), Roman pontiff () or sovereign pontiff, is the bishop of Rome (or historically the patriarch of Rome), head of the worldwide Cathol ...
in particular. These positions were brought to New England by English colonists who were predominantly Puritans
The Puritans were English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries who sought to purify the Church of England of Roman Catholic practices, maintaining that the Church of England had not been fully reformed and should become more Protestant. P ...
. They opposed not only the Catholic Church but also the Church of England which, due to its perpetuation of some Catholic doctrines and practices, was deemed insufficiently "reformed". Furthermore, English and Scottish identity to a large extent was based on opposition to Catholicism. "To be English was to be anti-Catholic," writes Robert Curran.
Because many of the British colonists, such as the Puritans
The Puritans were English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries who sought to purify the Church of England of Roman Catholic practices, maintaining that the Church of England had not been fully reformed and should become more Protestant. P ...
and Congregationalists
Congregational churches (also Congregationalist churches or Congregationalism) are Protestant churches in the Calvinist tradition practising congregationalist church governance, in which each congregation independently and autonomously runs its ...
, were fleeing religious persecution by the Church of England, much of early American religious culture exhibited the more extreme anti-Catholic bias of these Protestant denominations. Monsignor John Tracy Ellis
John Tracy Ellis (July 30, 1905 – October 16, 1992) was a Catholic Church historian and priest, born and raised in Seneca, Illinois, USA.
Ellis was ordained a priest and received a doctorate in history from Catholic University of America in Wash ...
wrote that a "universal anti-Catholic bias was brought to Jamestown in 1607 and vigorously cultivated in all the thirteen colonies from Massachusetts to Georgia". Colonial charters and laws often contained specific proscriptions against Catholics. For example, the second Massachusetts charter of October 7, 1691, decreed "that forever hereafter there shall be liberty of conscience allowed in the worship of God to all Christians, except Papist
The words Popery (adjective Popish) and Papism (adjective Papist, also used to refer to an individual) are mainly historical pejorative words in the English language for Roman Catholicism, once frequently used by Protestants and Eastern Orthodox ...
s, inhabiting, or which shall inhabit or be resident within, such Province or Territory". Historians have only identified one Catholic who lived in colonial BostonAnn Glover
Goody Ann Glover (died November 16, 1688) was the last person to be hanged in Boston as a witch, although the Salem witch trials in nearby Salem, Massachusetts, occurred mainly in 1692.
Early life and accounts
The trial of Ann Glover cannot ...
. She was hanged as a witch in 1688, four years before the much more famous witchcraft trials in nearby Salem.
Monsignor Ellis noted that a common hatred of the Catholic Church could unite Anglican
Anglicanism is a Western Christian tradition that has developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the context of the Protestant Reformation in Europe. It is one of th ...
clerics and Puritan
The Puritans were English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries who sought to purify the Church of England of Catholic Church, Roman Catholic practices, maintaining that the Church of England had not been fully reformed and should become m ...
ministers despite their differences and conflicts. One of the Intolerable Acts passed by the British Parliament that helped fuel the American Revolution
The American Revolution was an ideological and political revolution that occurred in British America between 1765 and 1791. The Americans in the Thirteen Colonies formed independent states that defeated the British in the American Revolut ...
was the Quebec Act of 1774, which granted freedom of worship to Roman Catholics in Canada.
New nation
The patriot reliance on Catholic France for military, financial and diplomatic aid led to a sharp drop in anti-Catholic rhetoric. Indeed, the king replaced the pope as the demon patriots had to fight against. Anti-Catholicism remained strong among loyalists, some of whom went to Canada after the war while most remained in the new nation. By the 1780s, Catholics were extended legal toleration in all of the New England states that previously had been so hostile. "In the midst of war and crisis, New Englanders gave up not only their allegiance to Britain but one of their most dearly held prejudices."
George Washington
George Washington (February 22, 1732, 1799) was an American military officer, statesman, and Founding Father who served as the first president of the United States from 1789 to 1797. Appointed by the Continental Congress as commander of th ...
was a vigorous promoter of tolerance for all religious denominations as commander of the army (1775–1783) where he suppressed anti-Catholic celebrations in the Army and appealed to French Catholics in Canada to join the American Revolution; a few hundred of them did. Likewise he guaranteed a high degree of freedom of religion as president (1789–1797), when he often attended services of different denominations. The military alliance with Catholic France in 1778 changed attitudes radically in Boston. Local leaders enthusiastically welcomed French naval and military officers, realizing the alliance was critical to winning independence. The Catholic chaplain of the French army reported in 1781 that he was continually receiving "new civilities" from the best families in Boston; he also noted that "the people in general retain their own prejudices." By 1790, about 500 Catholics in Boston formed the first Catholic Church there.
Fear of the pope agitated some of America's Founding Fathers
The following list of national founding figures is a record, by country, of people who were credited with establishing a state. National founders are typically those who played an influential role in setting up the systems of governance, (i.e. ...
. For example, in 1788, John Jay
John Jay (December 12, 1745 – May 17, 1829) was an American statesman, patriot, diplomat, abolitionist, signatory of the Treaty of Paris, and a Founding Father of the United States. He served as the second governor of New York and the first ...
urged the New York Legislature to prohibit Catholics from holding office. The legislature refused, but did pass a law designed to reach the same goal by requiring all office-holders to renounce foreign authorities "in all matters ecclesiastical as well as civil". Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 – July 4, 1826) was an American statesman, diplomat, lawyer, architect, philosopher, and Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father who served as the third president of the United States from 18 ...
, looking at the Catholic Church in France, wrote, "History, I believe, furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government", and "In every country and in every age, the priest has been hostile to liberty. He is always in alliance with the despot, abetting his abuses in return for protection to his own."
1840s–1850s
Anti-Catholic fears reached a peak in the nineteenth century when the Protestant population became alarmed by the influx of Catholic immigrants. Some Protestant ministers preached the belief that the Catholic Church is the Whore of Babylon
Babylon the Great, commonly known as the Whore of Babylon, refers to both a symbolic female figure and place of evil mentioned in the Book of Revelation in the Bible. Her full title is stated in Revelation 17 (verse 5) as "Mystery, Babylon the Gr ...
which is described in the Book of Revelation
The Book of Revelation is the final book of the New Testament (and consequently the final book of the Christian Bible). Its title is derived from the first word of the Koine Greek text: , meaning "unveiling" or "revelation". The Book of R ...
. The resulting "nativist" movement, which achieved prominence in the 1840s, was whipped into a frenzy of anti-Catholicism that led to mob violence, most notably the Philadelphia Nativist Riot
The Philadelphia nativist riots (also known as the Philadelphia Prayer Riots, the Bible Riots and the Native American Riots) were a series of riots that took place on May 68 and July 67, 1844, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States and the ...
of 1844. Historian David Montgomery argues that the Irish Catholic Democrats in Philadelphia had successfully appealed to the upper-class Whig leadership. The Whigs wanted to split the Democratic coalition, so they approved Bishop Kendrick's request that Catholic children be allowed to use their own Bible. That approval outraged the evangelical Protestant leadership, which rallied its support in Philadelphia and nationwide. Montgomery states:
:The school controversy, however, had united 94 leading clergymen of the city in a common pledge to strengthen Protestant education and "awaken the attention of the community to the dangers which... threaten these United States from the assaults of Romanism." The American Tract Society took up the battle cry and launched a national crusade to save the nation from the "spiritual despotism" of Rome. The whole Protestant edifice of churches, Bible societies, temperance societies, and missionary agencies was thus interposed against Catholic electoral maneuvers ... at the very moment when those maneuvers were enjoying some success.
The nativist movement found expression in a national political movement called the "American" or Know-Nothing Party
The Know Nothing party was a nativist political party and movement in the United States in the mid-1850s. The party was officially known as the "Native American Party" prior to 1855 and thereafter, it was simply known as the "American Party". ...
of 1854–56. It had considerable success in local and state elections in 1854–55 by emphasizing nativism and warning against Catholics and immigrants. It nominated former president Millard Fillmore
Millard Fillmore (January 7, 1800March 8, 1874) was the 13th president of the United States, serving from 1850 to 1853; he was the last to be a member of the Whig Party while in the White House. A former member of the U.S. House of Represen ...
as its presidential candidate in the 1856 election. However, Fillmore was not anti-Catholic or nativist; his campaign concentrated almost entirely on national unity. Historian Tyler Anbinder says, "The American party had dropped nativism from its agenda." Fillmore won 22% of the national popular vote.
In the Orange Riots
The Orange Riots took place in Manhattan, New York City, in 1870 and 1871, and they involved violent conflict between Irish Protestants who were members of the Orange Order and hence called "Orangemen", and Irish Catholics, along with the N ...
in New York City in 1871 and 1872, Irish Catholics violently attacked Irish Protestants, who carried orange banners.
Anti-Catholicism among American Jews
American Jews or Jewish Americans are American citizens who are Jewish, whether by religion, ethnicity, culture, or nationality. Today the Jewish community in the United States consists primarily of Ashkenazi Jews, who descend from diaspora J ...
further intensified in the 1850s during the international controversy over the Edgardo Mortara
The Mortara case ( it, caso Mortara, links=no) was an Italian ''cause célèbre'' that captured the attention of much of Europe and North America in the 1850s and 1860s. It concerned the Papal States' seizure of a six-year-old boy named Edgardo ...
case, when a baptized Jewish boy in the Papal States
The Papal States ( ; it, Stato Pontificio, ), officially the State of the Church ( it, Stato della Chiesa, ; la, Status Ecclesiasticus;), were a series of territories in the Italian Peninsula under the direct sovereign rule of the pope fro ...
was removed from his family and refused to return to them.
After 1875 many states passed constitutional provisions, called "Blaine Amendments
The Blaine Amendment was a failed amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would have prohibited direct government aid to educational institutions that have a religious affiliation. Most state constitutions already had such provisions, and thirty- ...
", forbidding tax money be used to fund parochial schools. In 2002, the United States Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...
partially vitiated these amendments, when they ruled that vouchers were constitutional if tax dollars followed a child to a school even if the school were religious.
A favorite rhetorical device in the 1870s was using the code words for Catholicism: “superstition, ambition and ignorance”. President Ulysses Grant in a major speech to veterans in October 1875 warned that America again faced an enemy: religious schools. Grant saw another civil war in the "near future": it would not be between North and South, but will be between "patriotism and intelligence on the one side and superstition, ambition and ignorance on the other." According to historian Charles W. Calhoun
Charles W. Calhoun (Born: Feb 24, 1948) is an American historian and academic. He is a professor at East Carolina University. He holds a BA, from Yale University; PhD, Columbia University. Calhoun is a member of the editorial board o ...
, "at various points in his life, Grant had bristled privately at what he considered religious communicants' thralldom to a domineering clergy, but he did not specifically mention Catholicism in his speech. Still, Catholic journals decried the president's seeming exploitation of religious bigotry." In his December 1875 Annual Message to Congress, Grant urged taxation on "vast amounts of untaxed church property" which Professor John McGreevey says was "a transparently anti-Catholic measure since only the Catholic Church owned vast amounts of propertyin schools, orphanages, and charitable institutions". Grant told Congress such legislation would protect American citizens from tyranny "whether directed by the demagogue or by priestcraft."
20th and 21st centuries
Anti-Catholicism played a major role in the defeat of Al Smith
Alfred Emanuel Smith (December 30, 1873 – October 4, 1944) was an American politician who served four terms as Governor of New York and was the Democratic Party's candidate for president in 1928.
The son of an Irish-American mother and a C ...
, the Democratic nominee for president in 1928. Smith did very well in Catholic precincts, but he did poorly in the South, as well as among the Lutherans of the North. His candidacy was also hampered by his close ties to the notorious Tammany Hall
Tammany Hall, also known as the Society of St. Tammany, the Sons of St. Tammany, or the Columbian Order, was a New York City political organization founded in 1786 and incorporated on May 12, 1789 as the Tammany Society. It became the main loc ...
political machine
In the politics of Representative democracy, representative democracies, a political machine is a party organization that recruits its members by the use of tangible incentives (such as money or political jobs) and that is characterized by a hig ...
in New York City and his strong opposition to prohibition
Prohibition is the act or practice of forbidding something by law; more particularly the term refers to the banning of the manufacture, storage (whether in barrels or in bottles), transportation, sale, possession, and consumption of alcoholic ...
. His cause was uphill in any case, because he faced a popular Republican leadership in a year of peace and unprecedented prosperity.
The passage of the 18th Amendment in 1919, a culmination of a half-century of anti-liquor agitation, also fueled anti-Catholic sentiment. Prohibition enjoyed strong support among dry pietistic Protestants, and equally strong opposition by wet Catholics, Episcopalians
Anglicanism is a Western Christian tradition that has developed from the practices, liturgy, and identity of the Church of England following the English Reformation, in the context of the Protestant Reformation in Europe. It is one of th ...
, and German Lutherans. The drys focused their distrust on the Catholics who showed little popular support for the enforcement of prohibition laws, and when the Great Depression
The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...
began in 1929, there was increasing sentiment that the government needed the tax revenue which the repeal of Prohibition would bring.
Over 10 million Protestant soldiers who served in World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
came into close contact with Catholic soldiers; they got along well and, after the war, they played a central role in spreading a greater level of ethnic and religious tolerance for Catholics among other white Americans
White Americans are Americans who identify as and are perceived to be white people. This group constitutes the majority of the people in the United States. As of the 2020 Census, 61.6%, or 204,277,273 people, were white alone. This represented ...
. Although anti-Catholic sentiment declined in the U.S. in the 1960s, particularly after John F. Kennedy
John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK and the nickname Jack, was an American politician who served as the 35th president of the United States from 1961 until his assassination i ...
became the first Catholic U.S. president, traces of it persist in both the media and popular culture. In March, 2000, the Catholic League criticized ''Slate'' magazine and journalist Jack Shafer
Jack Shafer (born November 14, 1957) is an American journalist who writes about media for ''Politico''. Prior to joining ''Politico'', he worked for Reuters and also edited and wrote the column'' "''Press Box" for ''Slate'', an online magazine. B ...
for a piece the League described as taking "delight in justifying anti-Catholicism." Attacks on persons and property have also continued to occur. The summer of 2020 saw a wave of anti-Catholic acts which ranged from the vandalization of churches and cathedrals; to the destruction and often the decapitation of statues, particularly statues of St Junipero Serra, Mary, and Jesus
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
; Illinois, and Florida. Many of these acts are tied to other political movements, most notably the QAnon movement, though other far right groups have also espoused anti-Catholic sentiment. One popular conspiracy is that the three stars on the DC flag stand for London, the Vatican and Washington. Another far right conspiracy claims the pope was arrested for sexual abuse.
In primarily Catholic countries
Anti-clericalism
Anti-clericalism is opposition to religious authority, typically in social or political matters. Historical anti-clericalism has mainly been opposed to the influence of Roman Catholicism. Anti-clericalism is related to secularism, which seeks to ...
is a historical movement that opposes religious (generally Catholic) institutional power and influence in all aspects of public and political life, and the involvement of religion in the everyday life of the citizen. It suggests a more active and partisan role than mere laïcité. The goal of anticlericalism is sometimes to reduce religion to a purely private belief-system with no public profile or influence. However, many times it has included outright suppression of all aspects of faith.
Anticlericalism has at times been violent, leading to murders and the desecration, destruction and seizure of Church property. Anticlericalism in one form or another has existed throughout most of Christian history, and it is considered to be one of the major popular forces underlying the 16th century reformation. Some of the philosophers of the Enlightenment
Enlightenment or enlighten may refer to:
Age of Enlightenment
* Age of Enlightenment, period in Western intellectual history from the late 17th to late 18th century, centered in France but also encompassing (alphabetically by country or culture): ...
, including Voltaire
François-Marie Arouet (; 21 November 169430 May 1778) was a French Age of Enlightenment, Enlightenment writer, historian, and philosopher. Known by his ''Pen name, nom de plume'' M. de Voltaire (; also ; ), he was famous for his wit, and his ...
, continually attacked the Catholic Church, both its leadership and its priests, claiming that many of its clergy were morally corrupt. These assaults in part led to the suppression of the Jesuits
The Society of Jesus ( la, Societas Iesu; abbreviation: SJ), also known as the Jesuits (; la, Iesuitæ), is a religious order (Catholic), religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rom ...
, and played a major part in the wholesale attacks on the very existence of the Church during the French Revolution
The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in November 1799. Many of its ideas are considere ...
in the Reign of Terror
The Reign of Terror (french: link=no, la Terreur) was a period of the French Revolution when, following the creation of the First Republic, a series of massacres and numerous public executions took place in response to revolutionary fervour, ...
and the program of dechristianization
The dechristianization of France during the French Revolution is a conventional description of the results of a number of separate policies conducted by various governments of France between the start of the French Revolution in 1789 and the Conc ...
. Similar attacks on the Church occurred in Mexico
Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...
and Portugal
Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic ( pt, República Portuguesa, links=yes ), is a country whose mainland is located on the Iberian Peninsula of Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Atlantic archipelagos of ...
since their 1910 revolutions and in Spain
, image_flag = Bandera de España.svg
, image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg
, national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond")
, national_anthem = (English: "Royal March")
, i ...
during the twentieth century.
Argentina
In 1954, Argentina
Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...
saw extensive destruction of churches, denunciations of clergy and confiscation of Catholic schools as Juan Perón
Juan Domingo Perón (, , ; 8 October 1895 – 1 July 1974) was an Argentine Army general and politician. After serving in several government positions, including Minister of Labour and Vice President of a military dictatorship, he was elected P ...
attempted to extend state control over national institutions such as the Catholic Church in Argentina.[Norman, ''The Roman Catholic Church an Illustrated History'' (2007), pp. 167–168]
Austria
Holy Roman Empire
Holy Roman Emperor
The Holy Roman Emperor, originally and officially the Emperor of the Romans ( la, Imperator Romanorum, german: Kaiser der Römer) during the Middle Ages, and also known as the Roman-German Emperor since the early modern period ( la, Imperat ...
Joseph II (emperor 1765–1790) opposed what he called "contemplative" religious institutionsreclusive Catholic institutions that he perceived as doing nothing positive for the community. Although Joseph II was himself a Catholic, he also believed in firm state control of ecclesiastical matters outside of the strictly religious sphere and decreed that Austrian bishops could not communicate directly with the Roman Curia. His policies are included in what is called Josephinism, that promoted the subjection of the Catholic Church in the Habsburg
The House of Habsburg (), alternatively spelled Hapsburg in Englishgerman: Haus Habsburg, ; es, Casa de Habsburgo; hu, Habsburg család, it, Casa di Asburgo, nl, Huis van Habsburg, pl, dom Habsburgów, pt, Casa de Habsburgo, la, Domus Hab ...
lands to service for the state.
Austro-Hungary
Georg Ritter von Schönerer (1842–1921) was an Austrian
Austrian may refer to:
* Austrians, someone from Austria or of Austrian descent
** Someone who is considered an Austrian citizen, see Austrian nationality law
* Austrian German dialect
* Something associated with the country Austria, for example: ...
landowner and politician of Austro-Hungary
Austria-Hungary, often referred to as the Austro-Hungarian Empire,, the Dual Monarchy, or Austria, was a constitutional monarchy and great power in Central Europe between 1867 and 1918. It was formed with the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of ...
. He was a major opponent of political Catholicism and the founder of the movement ''Away from Rome!
''Away from Rome!'' (german: Los-von-Rom-Bewegung) was a religious movement founded in Austria by the Pan-German politician Georg Ritter von Schönerer aimed at conversion of all the Roman Catholic German-speaking population of Austria to Lutheran ...
'', aimed the conversion of all the Catholic German-speaking
German ( ) is a West Germanic language mainly spoken in Central Europe. It is the most widely spoken and official or co-official language in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, and the Italian province of South Tyrol. It is also a ...
population of Austria
Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...
to Lutheranism
Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and Protestant Reformers, reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Cathol ...
, or, in some cases, to the Old Catholic Churches.
Brazil
Brazil has the largest number of Catholics in the world,[IBGE – Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística (Brazilian Institute for Geography and Statistics). ''Religion in Brazil – 2000 Census''](_blank)
Retrieved 2009-01-06. and as a result, it has not experienced any large anti-Catholic movements.
During the Nineteenth Century, the Religious Question The Religious Question ('' pt, Questão Religiosa'') was a crisis in the 1870s between the Catholic church and the state apparatus of the Brazilian Empire. It led to the imprisonment of two bishops and contributed to the downfall of the government ...
was the name given to the crisis when Freemasons in the Brazilian government imprisoned two Catholic bishops for enforcing the Church's prohibition against Freemasonry
Freemasonry or Masonry refers to fraternal organisations that trace their origins to the local guilds of stonemasons that, from the end of the 13th century, regulated the qualifications of stonemasons and their interaction with authorities ...
.
Even during times in which the Church was experiencing intense conservatism
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilizati ...
, such as the era of the Brazilian military dictatorship
The military dictatorship in Brazil ( pt, ditadura militar) was established on 1 April 1964, after a coup d'état by the Brazilian Armed Forces, with support from the United States government, against President João Goulart. The Brazilian dict ...
, anti-Catholicism was not advocated by the left-wing
Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy. Left-wing politics typically involve a concern for those in soci ...
movements (instead, Liberation theology gained force). However, with the growing number of Protestants (especially Neo-Pentecostals) in the country, anti-Catholicism has gained strength. A pivotal moment during the rise of anti-Catholicism was the kicking of the saint
The "Chute na santa" ( pt, Chute na santa - "kicking on the saint") incident was a religious controversy that erupted in Brazil in late 1995, sparked by a live broadcast of a minister of Universal Church of the Kingdom of God (UCKG), the largest p ...
episode in 1995. However, owing to the protests of the Catholic majority, the perpetrator was transferred to South Africa
South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...
for the duration of the controversy.
During the COVID-19 pandemic in Brazil
The COVID-19 pandemic in Brazil has resulted in confirmed cases of COVID-19 and deaths. The virus was confirmed to have spread to Brazil on 25 February 2020, when a man from São Paulo who had traveled to Italy tested positive for the virus. ...
, drug dealers took advantage of the pandemic to unite five slums in Rio de Janeiro
Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the state of the same name, Brazil's third-most populous state, and the second-most populous city in Brazil, after São Paulo. Listed by the GaWC as a b ...
imposing evangelical Protestantism
Evangelicalism (), also called evangelical Christianity or evangelical Protestantism, is a worldwide interdenominational movement within Protestant Christianity that affirms the centrality of being "born again", in which an individual experi ...
on the area and attacking Catholics (and also members of Umbanda
Umbanda () is a syncretic Afro-Brazilian religion that blends traditional African religions with Roman Catholicism, Spiritism, and Indigenous American beliefs. Although some of its beliefs and most of its practices existed in the late 19th cent ...
).
Colombia
Anti-Catholic and anti-clerical sentiments, some of which were spurred by an anti-clerical conspiracy theory
A conspiracy theory is an explanation for an event or situation that invokes a conspiracy by sinister and powerful groups, often political in motivation, when other explanations are more probable.Additional sources:
*
*
*
* The term has a nega ...
which was circulating in Colombia during the mid-twentieth century, led to the persecution and killing of Catholics, most specifically, the persecution and killing of members of the Catholic clergy, during the events which are known as La Violencia.
Cuba
Cuba
Cuba ( , ), officially the Republic of Cuba ( es, República de Cuba, links=no ), is an island country comprising the island of Cuba, as well as Isla de la Juventud and several minor archipelagos. Cuba is located where the northern Caribbea ...
, under the rule of the atheist
Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no ...
Fidel Castro
Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz (; ; 13 August 1926 – 25 November 2016) was a Cuban revolutionary and politician who was the leader of Cuba from 1959 to 2008, serving as the prime minister of Cuba from 1959 to 1976 and president from 1976 to 200 ...
, succeeded in reducing the ability of the Catholic Church to work by deporting one archbishop and 150 Spanish priests, by discriminating against Catholics in public life and education and refusing to accept them as members of the Communist Party
A communist party is a political party that seeks to realize the socio-economic goals of communism. The term ''communist party'' was popularized by the title of ''The Manifesto of the Communist Party'' (1848) by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. A ...
. The subsequent flight of 300,000 Cubans from the island also helped to diminish the Church there.[Chadwick, ''A History of Christianity'' (1995), p. 266]
France
During the French Revolution
The French Revolution ( ) was a period of radical political and societal change in France that began with the Estates General of 1789 and ended with the formation of the French Consulate in November 1799. Many of its ideas are considere ...
(1789–95), the clergy and the laity were persecuted and Church property was confiscated and destroyed by the new government as part of a process of ''Dechristianization
The dechristianization of France during the French Revolution is a conventional description of the results of a number of separate policies conducted by various governments of France between the start of the French Revolution in 1789 and the Conc ...
'', the aims of which were the destruction of Catholic practices and the destruction of the very faith itself, culminating in the imposition of the atheistic Cult of Reason
The Cult of Reason (french: Culte de la Raison) was France's first established state-sponsored atheistic religion, intended as a replacement for Roman Catholicism during the French Revolution. After holding sway for barely a year, in 1794 it ...
followed by the imposition of the deistic
Deism ( or ; derived from the Latin ''deus'', meaning "god") is the philosophical position and rationalistic theology that generally rejects revelation as a source of divine knowledge, and asserts that empirical reason and observation of t ...
Cult of the Supreme Being
The Cult of the Supreme Being (french: Culte de l'Être suprême) was a form of deism established in France by Maximilien Robespierre during the French Revolution. It was intended to become the state religion of the new French Republic and a re ...
.[Tallet, Fran]
Religion, Society and Politics in France Since 1789
pp. 1–2, 1991 Continuum International Publishing The persecution led Catholics who lived in the west of France to wage a counterrevolution, the War in the Vendée, and when the state was victorious, it killed tens of thousands of Catholics. A few historians have called the killings a genocide
Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people—usually defined as an ethnic, national, racial, or religious group—in whole or in part. Raphael Lemkin coined the term in 1944, combining the Greek word (, "race, people") with the Latin ...
. However, most historians believe that the killings constituted a brutal crackdown against political enemies rather than a genocide. The French invasions of Italy (1796–99) included an assault on Rome and the exile of Pope Pius VI
Pope Pius VI ( it, Pio VI; born Count Giovanni Angelo Braschi, 25 December 171729 August 1799) was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 15 February 1775 to his death in August 1799.
Pius VI condemned the French Revoluti ...
in 1798.
Relations improved in 1802 when Napoleon
Napoleon Bonaparte ; it, Napoleone Bonaparte, ; co, Napulione Buonaparte. (born Napoleone Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French military commander and political leader who ...
came to terms with the Pope in the Concordat of 1801. It allowed the Church to operate but did not give back the lands; it proved satisfactory for a century. By 1815 the Papacy supported the growing alliance against Napoleon, and was re-instated as the State Church during the conservative Bourbon Restoration in France, Bourbon Restoration of 1815–30. The brief French Revolution of 1848 again opposed the Church, but the Second French Empire (1851–71) gave it full support. The history of 1789–1871 had established two campsthe left against the Church and the right supporting itthat largely continued until the Vatican II process in 1962–65.
France's French Third Republic, Third Republic (1871–1940) was cemented by anti-clericalism, the desire to secularise the State and social life, faithful to the French Revolution. This was the position of the radicals and socialists. in 1902 Émile Combes became Minister of the Interior, and the main energy of the government was devoted to an anti-clerical agenda.["Emile Combes who boasted of taking office for the sole purpose of destroying the religious orders. He closed thousands of what were not then called 'faith schools']
Bigots united
in the Guardian, 9 October 2005 The parties of the Left, Socialists and Radicals, united upon this question in the ''Bloc republicain'', supported Combes in his application of the law of 1901 on the religious associations, and voted the new bill on the congregations (1904). By 1904, through his efforts, nearly 10,000 religious schools had been closed and thousands of priests and nuns left France rather than be persecuted. Under his guidance parliament moved toward the 1905 French law on the separation of Church and State, which ended the Napoleonic arrangement of 1801.
In the Affaire Des Fiches, in France in 1904–1905, it was discovered that the militantly anticlerical War Minister under Combes, General Louis André, was determining promotions based on the French Anticlericalism and Freemasonry, Masonic Grand Orient's huge card index on public officials, detailing which were Catholic and who attended Mass, with the goal of preventing their promotions. Exposure almost caused the government to fall; instead Combes retired.
Italy
In the Napoleonic era, anti-clericalism was a powerful political force. From 1860 through 1870, the new Italian government, under the House of Savoy, outlawed all religious orders, both male and female, including the Franciscans, the Dominican Order, Dominicans and the Jesuits
The Society of Jesus ( la, Societas Iesu; abbreviation: SJ), also known as the Jesuits (; la, Iesuitæ), is a religious order (Catholic), religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rom ...
, closed down their monasteries and confiscated their property, and imprisoned or banished bishops who opposed this (see Kulturkampf
(, 'culture struggle') was the conflict that took place from 1872 to 1878 between the Catholic Church led by Pope Pius IX and the government of Prussia led by Otto von Bismarck. The main issues were clerical control of education and ecclesiastic ...
). Capture of Rome, Italy took over Rome in 1870 when it lost its French protection; the Pope declared himself a prisoner in the Vatican. Relations were finally normalized in 1929 with the Lateran Treaty.
Mexico
Following the Reform War, President Benito Juárez issued a decree nationalizing Church properties, separating Church and State, and suppressing religious orders.
In the wake of the Mexican Revolution, the Constitution of Mexico, Mexican Constitution of 1917 contained further anti-clerical provisions. Article 3 called for secular education in the schools and prohibited the Church from engaging in primary education; Article 5 outlawed monastic orders; Article 24 forbade public worship outside the confines of churches; and Article 27 placed restrictions on the right of religious organizations to hold property. Article 130 deprived clergy members of political rights.
Mexican President Plutarco Elías Calles's strict enforcement of previous anti-clerical legislation denying priests' rights, enacted as the Calles Law, prompted the Mexican Episcopate to suspend all Catholic worship in Mexico from August 1, 1926, and sparked the bloody Cristero War of 1926–1929 in which some 50,000 peasants took up arms against the government. Their slogan was "¡Viva Cristo Rey!" (Long live Christ the King!).
The effects of the war on the Church were profound. Between 1926 and 1934 at least 40 priests were killed.[Van Hove, Bria]
Blood-Drenched Altars
Faith & Reason 1994 Where there were 4,500 priests serving the people before the rebellion, in 1934 there were only 334 priests licensed by the government to serve fifteen million people, the rest having been eliminated by emigration, expulsion, assassination or not obtaining licenses.[Scheina, Robert L]
''Latin America's Wars: The Age of the Caudillo, 1791–1899''
p. 33 (2003
Brassey's) It appears that ten states were left without any priests. Other sources indicate that the persecution was such that, by 1935, 17 states had no registered priests.
Some of the Catholic casualties of this struggle are known as the Saints of the Cristero War. Events relating to this were famously portrayed in the novel ''The Power and the Glory'' by Graham Greene.
Poland
''For the situation in Russian Poland, see Anticatholicism#Russian Empire, Anticatholicism in Russian Empire''
Catholicism in Poland, the religion of the vast majority of the population, was severely persecuted during World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, following the Nazi invasion of the country and its subsequent annexation into Germany. Over 3 million Catholics of Polish descent were murdered during the Invasion of Poland, including 3 bishops, 52 priests, 26 monks, 3 seminarians, 8 nuns and 9 lay people, later beatified in 1999 by Pope John Paul II as the 108 Martyrs of World War II.
The Roman Catholic Church was even more violently suppressed in Reichsgau Wartheland and the General Government.[John S. Conway, "The Nazi Persecution of the Churches, 1933–1945", Regent College Publishing, 1997] Churches were closed, and clergy were deported, imprisoned, or killed, among them was Maximilian Kolbe, a Pole of German descent. Between 1939 and 1945, 2,935 members of the Polish clergy (18%) were killed in concentration camps. In the city of Chełmno, for example, 48% of the Catholic clergy were killed.
Catholicism continued to be persecuted under the People's Republic of Poland, Communist regime from the 1950s. Contemporary Stalinism, Stalinist ideology claimed that the Church and religion in general were about to disintegrate. Initially, Stefan Wyszyński, Archbishop Wyszyński entered into an agreement with the Communist authorities, which was signed on 14 February 1950 by the Polish episcopate and the government. The Agreement regulated the matters of the Church in Poland. However, in May of that year, the Sejm breached the Agreement by passing a law for the confiscation of Church property.
On 12 January 1953, Wyszyński was elevated to the rank of cardinal by Pius XII as another wave of persecution began in Poland. When the bishops voiced their opposition to state interference in ecclesiastical appointments, mass trials and the internment of priests beganthe cardinal being one of its victims. On 25 September 1953 he was imprisoned at Grudziądz, and later placed under house arrest in monasteries in Prudnik near Opole and in Komańcza Monastery in the Bieszczady Mountains. He was released on 26 October 1956.
Pope John Paul II, who was born in Poland as Karol Wojtyla, often cited the persecution of Polish Catholics in his stance against Communism.
Spain
Anti-clericalism in Spain at the start of the Spanish Civil War resulted in the killing of almost 7,000 clergy, the destruction of hundreds of churches and the persecution of lay people in Spain's Red Terror (Spain), Red Terror. Hundreds of Martyrs of the Spanish Civil War have been beatified and hundreds more in October 2007.
In mixed Catholic-Protestant countries
Switzerland
The Jesuits (Societas Jesu) were banned from all activities in either clerical or pedagogical functions by Article 51 of the Swiss constitution in 1848. The reason for the ban was the perceived threat to the stability of the state resulting from Jesuit advocacy of traditional Catholicism; it followed the Roman Catholic cantons forming an unconstitutional ''separate alliance'' leading to Sonderbund War, civil war. In June 1973, 55% of Swiss voters approved removing the ban on the Jesuits (as well as Article 52 which banned monasteries and convents from Switzerland). (See ''Kulturkampf
(, 'culture struggle') was the conflict that took place from 1872 to 1878 between the Catholic Church led by Pope Pius IX and the government of Prussia led by Otto von Bismarck. The main issues were clerical control of education and ecclesiastic ...
'' and ''Religion in Switzerland'')
In primarily Orthodox countries
Byzantine Empire
In the East–West Schism of 1054 the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Catholic Church broke their full communion with each other because of Eastern Orthodox – Roman Catholic ecclesiastical differences, Ecclesiastical differences, Theological differences between the Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church, Theological, and Liturgical disputes.
In April 1182, the Eastern Orthodox population of the Byzantine Empire committed a large-scale massacre against the Catholic population of Constantinople, this massacre is known as the Massacre of the Latins and it further worsened relations and increased enmity between Eastern Orthodoxy and Catholicism.
Russian Empire
During Russian rule, Catholics, primarily Poles and Lithuanians, suffered great persecution not only because of their ethnic-national background, but also for religious reasons. Especially after the uprisings of November Uprising, 1831 and January Uprising, 1863, and within the process of Russification (understanding that there is a strong link between religion and nationality), the tsarist authorities were anxious to promote the conversion of these peoples to the official faith, intervening in public education in those regions (an Russian Orthodox Church, Orthodox religious education was compulsory) and censoring the actions of the Catholic Church. In particular, attention was focused on the public actions of the Church, such as masses or funerals, because they could serve as the focus of protests against the occupation. Many priests were imprisoned or deported because of their activities in defense of their religion and ethnicity. In the late nineteenth century, however, there was a progressive relaxation of the control of Catholic institutions by the Russian authorities.
Former Yugoslavia
During World War II in Yugoslavia, the Chetniks killed an estimated 18,000-32,000 Croats, who were mostly Roman Catholic. The terror tactics against the Croats were, to at least an extent, a reaction to the Genocide of Serbs in the Independent State of Croatia, terror carried out by the Ustaše against Serbs. Along with mass murder, the Ustashe conducted religious persecution of Serbs that included a policy of forced conversion from Eastern Orthodoxy to Roman Catholicism, often with the Catholic clergy involvement with the Ustaše, participation of local Catholic priests. However, the largest Chetnik massacres took place in eastern Bosnia where they preceded any significant Ustashe operations. Croats (and Muslims) living in areas intended to be part of Greater Serbia were to be cleansed of non-Serbs regardless, in accordance with Mihailović's directive of 20 December 1941. About 300 villages and small towns were destroyed, along with a large number of mosques and Catholic churches. 52 Priesthood in the Catholic Church, Catholic priests were killed by Chetniks throughout the war. A number of Catholic nuns were also raped and killed, including the Blessed Martyrs of Drina, killing of several nuns from Goražde in December 1941.
During the Croatian War of Independence, war in Croatia, the ICTY determined that ethnic Croats were persecuted on political, racial and religious grounds, as part of a general campaign of killings and forced-removals of Croat civilians. This included the deliberate destruction of religious buildings and monuments. Approximately 450 Catholic churches were destroyed or severely damaged, with another 250 suffering lesser damages. In addition, approximately 151 rectories, 31 monasteries, and 57 cemeteries were destroyed or severely damaged. While another 269 religious buildings were destroyed during the Bosnian War.
Ukraine
In the separatist region known as the Donetsk People's Republic, the government has declared that the Russian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate is the state religion, and Protestant churches have been occupied by paramilitaries. Jehovah's Witnesses have lost their property, and their Kingdom Halls have been occupied by rebels in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions. Roman Catholic, Greek Catholic, Ukrainian Orthodox, and Protestant clergy have been kidnapped by groups such as the Russian Orthodox Army, and they have also been accused of opposing Russian Orthodox values. Human Rights Watch says that the bodies of several members of the Church of the Transfiguration were found in a mass grave in 2014.
Non-Christian nations
Bangladesh
On 3 June 2001, nine people were killed by a 2001 Gopalganj Roman Catholic church bombing, bomb explosion at a Roman Catholic church in the Gopalganj District.
Burkina Faso
On May 12, 2019, six Catholics including a priest were killed by gunmen who rode on motorcycles and stormed a church in Dablo during a Sunday morning mass. A day later, on May 13, 2019, four people were killed and a statue of the Virgin Mary was destroyed by armed men in an attack on Catholic parishioners during a religious procession in the remote village of Zimtenga.
China
The Daoguang Emperor modified an existing law, making the spread of Catholicism punishable by death.
During the Boxer Rebellion, Catholic missionaries and their families were murdered by Boxer rebels. During the 1905 Tibetan Rebellion, Tibetan rebels murdered Catholics and Tibetan converts.
Since the founding of the People's Republic of China, all religions including Catholicism only operate Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association, under state control. However, many Catholics do not accept State control of the Church and as a result, they worship clandestinely.[U.S Department of State]
International Religious Freedom Report 2010: China
17 Nov 2010. There has been some rapprochement between the Chinese government and the Vatican.
Christianity in China, Chinese Christians have reportedly been persecuted in both official and unsanctioned churches. In 2018, the Associated Press reported that China's paramount leader Xi Jinping "is waging the most severe systematic suppression of Christianity in the country since religious freedom was written into the Chinese constitution in 1982", which has involved "destroying crosses, burning bibles, shutting churches and ordering followers to sign papers renouncing their faith".
Japan
On 5 February 1597 Twenty-six Martyrs of Japan, a group of twenty-six Catholics were killed on the orders of Toyotomi Hideyoshi.
During the Tokugawa Shogunate, Catholic Church in Japan, Japanese Catholics were suppressed, leading to Shimabara Rebellion, an armed rebellion during the 1630s. After the rebellion was crushed, Catholicism was further suppressed and many Japanese Catholics Kakure Kirishitan, went underground. Catholicism was not openly restored to Japan until the Oura Church, 1850s.
North Korea
South Korea
Catholic priests and nuns have been arrested and harassed for protesting against the construction of the Jeju Naval Base controversy, Jeju Island Naval Base.
Sri Lanka
Government actions
In Sri Lanka, A Buddhism, Buddhist-influenced government took over 600 parish schools in 1960 without compensation and secularized them. Attempts were made by future governments to restore some autonomy.
Anti-Catholic violence
Since 2000, in a context of rising violence against Religion in Sri Lanka, religious minorities, i.e. Christians, Muslims and Hindus, multiple attacks on Catholic churches occurred. For instance, in 2009, a mob of 1,000 smashed the interior of a church in the town of Crooswatta, assaulting parishioners with clubs, swords and stones, forcing several of them to be treated in hospitals. In 2013, vandals smashed a statue of the Virgin Mary as well as a tabernacle, and they also tried to burn the Eucharist at a church in Angulana, near Colombo.
The term "anti-Catholic Catholic" has come to be applied to Catholics who are perceived to view the Catholic Church with animosity. Traditionalist Catholic, Traditionalist or conservative Catholics frequently use it as a descriptive term for Modernism in the Catholic Church, modernist or liberal Catholics, especially those modernist or liberal Catholics who seek to reform Church doctrine, make secularist critiques of the Catholic Church, or place secular principles above Church teachings. Those who take issue with the Catholic theology of sexuality are especially prone to be given this label.
Suppression of the Jesuits
Sebastião José de Carvalho e Melo, 1st Marquis of Pombal, Prime Minister Pombal of Portugal was aggressively hostile to the Society of Jesus, Jesuit order because it reported to an Italian powerthe Popeand it also tried to operate independently rather than operate under the control of the government. In Portugal as well as in much of Catholic Europe, he waged a full-scale war against the Jesuits. The Jesuit order was suppressed in the Portuguese Empire (1759), France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
(1764), the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, Two Sicilies, Malta, Parma, the Spanish Empire (1767), and Austrian Empire, Austria and Kingdom of Hungary, Hungary (1782). The Pope himself suppressed the order everywhere in 1773, but it survived in Russian Empire, Russia and Prussia. The suppression of the Jesuits was a major blow to Catholic education across Europe, with nearly 1000 secondary schools and seminaries were shut down. Their lands, buildings, and endowments were confiscated; their teachers were scattered. Although Jesuit education had become old fashioned in Poland and other areas, it was the main educational support network for Catholic intellectuals, senior clergy, and prominent families. Governments unsuccessfully attempted to replace all of those schools, but there were far too few non-clerical teachers who were suitable.
The Jesuit order was restored by the pope in 1814 and it flourished in terms of rebuilding schools and educational institutions but it never regained its enormous political power. The suppression of the Jesuits has been described as "an unmitigated disaster for Catholicism." The political weakness of the once-powerful institution was on public display for more ridicule and bullying. The Church lost its best educational system, its best missionary system, and its most innovative thinkers. Intellectually, it would take two centuries for the Church to fully recover.
In popular culture
Anti-Catholic stereotypes are a long-standing feature of English literature, Genre fiction, popular fiction, and pornography. Gothic fiction is particularly rich in this regard. Lustful priests, cruel abbesses, immured nuns, and sadistic inquisitors appear in such works as ''The Italian (Radcliffe novel), The Italian'' by Ann Radcliffe, ''The Monk'' by Matthew Lewis (writer), Matthew Lewis, ''Melmoth the Wanderer'' by Charles Maturin and "The Pit and the Pendulum" by Edgar Allan Poe.[Patrick R O'Malley (2006) ''Catholicism, sexual deviance, and Victorian Gothic culture''. Cambridge University Press]
See also
*Anti-Papalism
*Black Legend (Spain), Black Legend
*Catholic revival
*History of Christianity
**History of the Catholic Church
**History of the Eastern Orthodox Church
**History of Protestantism
*Protestant Revolutionary Propaganda
*The Great Apostasy
*Persecution of Christians
*Persecution of Christians by Christians
*Sectarian violence among Christians
References
Sources
*
*
*
*
*
Further reading
* Anbinder, Tyler. ''Nativism and Slavery: The Northern Know Nothings and the Politics of the 1850s'' 1992; in U.S.
*
* Bennett, David H. ''The Party of Fear: From Nativist Movements to the New Right in American History'' University of North Carolina Press, 1988
* Blanshard, Paul. ''American Freedom and Catholic Power'' Beacon Press, 1949; famous attack on Catholicism
* Brown, Thomas M. "The Image of the Beast: Anti-Papal Rhetoric in Colonial America", in Richard O. Curry and Thomas M. Brown, eds., ''Conspiracy: The Fear of Subversion in American History'' (1972), 1–20.
* Bruce, Steve. ''No Pope of Rome: Anti-Catholicism in Modern Scotland'' (Edinburgh, 1985).
*
* Cogliano, Francis D. ''No King, No Popery: Anti-Catholicism in Revolutionary New England'' Greenwood Press, 1995
* Cruz, Joel Morales. ''The Mexican Reformation: Catholic Pluralism, Enlightenment Religion, and the Iglesia de Jesus Movement in Benito Juarez's Mexico (1859–72)'' (Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2011).
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*
* Greeley, Andrew M. ''An Ugly Little Secret: Anti-Catholicism in North America'' 1977.
* Henry, David. "Senator John F. Kennedy Encounters the Religious Question: I Am Not the Catholic Candidate for President." in ''Contemporary American Public Discourse'' Ed. H. R. Ryan. Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland Press, Inc., 1992. 177–193.
* Higham; John. ''Strangers in the Land: Patterns of American Nativism, 1860–1925'' 1955
*
* Hostetler; Michael J. "Gov. Al Smith Confronts the Catholic Question: The Rhetorical Legacy of the 1928 Campaign," ''Communication Quarterly'' (1998) 46#1 pp 12+.
* Jensen, Richard. ''The Winning of the Midwest: Social and Political Conflict, 1888–1896'' (1971)
* Joskowicz, Ari. ''The Modernity of Others: Jewish Anti-Catholicism in Germany and France'' (Stanford University Press; 2013) 376 pages; how Jewish intellectuals defined themselves as modern against the anti-modern positions of the Catholic Church
* Latourette, Kenneth Scott. ''Christianity in a Revolutionary Age'' (5 vol 1969), covers 1790s to 1960; comprehensive global history
*
* Keating, Karl. ''Catholicism and FundamentalismThe Attack on "Romanism" by "Bible Christians"'' (Ignatius Press, 1988).
* Lehner, Ulrich and Michael Printy, eds. ''A Companion to the Catholic Enlightenment in Europe'' (2010)
*
* Moore; Leonard J. ''Citizen Klansmen: The Ku Klux Klan in Indiana, 1921–1928'' University of North Carolina Press, 1991
* Mourret, Fernand. ''History Of The Catholic Church'' (8 vol, 1931) comprehensive history to 1878. country by country
online free
by French Catholic priest; see vols. 6-7-8.
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*
* Thiemann, Ronald F. ''Religion in Public Life'' Georgetown University Press, 1996.
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*
* Wolffe, John, ed., ''Protestant-Catholic Conflict from the Reformation to the Twenty-first Century'' (Palgrave Macmillan UK, 2013)
Table of contents
* Wolffe, John. "A Comparative Historical Categorisation of Anti‐Catholicism." ''Journal of Religious History'' 39.2 (2015): 182–202
online free
External links
Observatory on Intolerance and Discrimination Against Christians in Europe
{{Authority control
Anti-Catholicism,
Anti-Catholic organizations
Anti-Christian sentiment
Anti-clericalism
Catholic studies
Christianity and other religions
Criticism of the Catholic Church
Persecution of Catholics
Relations between Christian denominations