International Journal of Social Science Studies Vol. 1, No. 1; April 2013 ISSN 2324-8033 E-ISSN 2324-8041 Published by Redfame Publishing Non-institutionalised Lay Religious Communities in the Czech Republic and the Care for the Ill Strategy Jan Váně1 1Department of Sociology, Faculty of Philosophy and Arts, University of West Bohemia, Czech Republic Correspondence: Jan Váně, Department of Sociology, Faculty of Philosophy and Arts, University of West Bohemia, Avalon, Poděbradova 1, 306 14 Plzen, Czech Republic. E-mail:
[email protected] Received: January 10, 2013 Accepted: February 25, 2013 Available online: February 22, 2013 doi:10.11114/ijsss.v1i1.74 URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.11114/ijsss.v1i1.74 This study is supported by the “Institutional support for long-term development of organization – Department of Sociology – UWB” grant. Abstract The objective of this study is to focus on how two non-institutionalised lay religious communities in the Czech Republic, selected for this research, apply an adaptation strategy called the care for the ill strategy. The aim is to demonstrate the way these communities view the phenomenon of health/illness and how it is reflected in their relationship to the Catholic Church. This paper is part of a larger ethnographic study that analyses activities carried out by non-institutionalised religious communities active in the Catholic environment. Keywords: Catholic Church in the Czech Republic, non-institutionalised communities, care for the ill strategy 1. Introduction Jose Casanova, a scholar working in the field of sociology of religion, has pointed out that in late modern societies religion has vacated the private sphere to which it had been confined earlier and is now entering the undifferentiated sphere of civil society, where it is involved in the fight over the legitimacy of society, including the conflicts over the redrawing of the social boundaries that had thus far been accepted as valid.