Tilburg University A Catholic minority church in a world of seekers Hellemans, Staf; Jonkers, Peter Publication date: 2015 Document Version Early version, also known as pre-print Link to publication in Tilburg University Research Portal Citation for published version (APA): Hellemans, S., & Jonkers, P. (2015). A Catholic minority church in a world of seekers. (Christian Philosophical Studies; Vol. XI). Council for Research in Values and Philosophy. 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McLean A Catholic Minority Church in a World of Seekers Western Philosophical Studies, IX Christian Philosophical Studies, XI Edited by Staf Hellemans Peter Jonkers The Council for Research in Values and Philosophy Copyright © 2015 by The Council for Research in Values and Philosophy Box 261 Cardinal Station Washington, D.C. 20064 All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication A Catholic minority church in a world of seekers / edited by Staf Hellemans and Peter Jonkers. -- first [edition]. pages cm. -- (Cultural heritage and contemporary change. Series IV, Western European philosophical studies ; Volume 9) (Cultural heritage and contemporary change. Series VIII, Christian philosophical studies ; Volume 11) Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Catholic Church--Europe. 2. Christianity--Europe. I. Hellemans, Staf, editor. BX1551.2.A67 2015 2014041774 282'.492--dc23 CIP ISBN ISBN 978-1-56518-301-8 (pbk.) TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction: The Contingent Meeting of a Catholic Minority 1 Church with Seekers Staf Hellemans and Peter Jonkers PART I: EMPIRICAL INVESTIGATIONS Chapter I. Patterns of European Religious Life 21 Loek Halman Chapter II. Floating believers: Dutch Seekers and the Church 71 Joep de Hart and Paul Dekker Chapter III. Seekers and the Christian Spiritual Centers in 97 the Netherlands Kees de Groot and Jos Pieper Chapter IV. Imagining the Catholic Church in a World of Seekers 129 Staf Hellemans PART II: PHILOSOPHICAL AND THEOLOGICAL REFLECTIONS Chapter V. From Rational Doctrine to Christian Wisdom 163 Peter Jonkers Chapter VI. The Exile of the Religious Subject: A Newmanian 193 Perspective on Religion in Contemporary Society Terrence Merrigan Chapter VII. Exploring Public Life as a Sacrament: 223 On Divine Promise in a World of Seekers Stephan van Erp Chapter VIII. The Roman-Catholic Church in Late Modernity: 243 Analyses and Perspectives from a Western Point of View Rainer Bucher Index 269 INTRODUCTION THE CONTINGENT MEETING OF A CATHOLIC MINORITY CHURCH WITH SEEKERS STAF HELLEMANS and PETER JONKERS It cannot be denied that the Catholic Church – like the other main churches in the West – has undergone deep and lasting changes since the 1960s. Two changes stand as paramount. First, the Catholic Church is transitioning from a majority church or a closed Catholic subculture to becoming, in many countries, a minority church, operating in a predominantly secular and competitive environment with a smaller committed following and with less institutional resources at its disposal. Second, the ways in which people relate to the Church are changing as well. Commitment is no longer self-evident or deferential. Once characterized as a flock led by their shepherds, those interested and active in the Church today exhibit a more critical and seeking attitude. These developments, as well as some other important trends regarding the role of the Catholic Church in society, will be examined in the first, empirical part of this book; in the second, philosophical and theological part, the consequences of the new situation for the Catholic Church and its theology will be studied. The present chapter, which serves as an introduction to this volume and builds on its contributions, is focused on characterizing the present-day relationship between the Church and seekers and on exploring, on a basic level, some new opportunities for a Catholic minority church to continue to appeal to larger sections of the population. The analyses and prospects presented in this volume are, of course, heavily influenced by the situation of the Church and its societal context in the countries in which we, as contributors, are living and working, i.e. Belgium and the Netherlands, and, for one author, Germany and Austria. These European countries are regarded to be highly secularized, meaning that the main Christian churches have lost much of their former societal significance. We are aware that another territorial vantage point, e.g., Italy or the Philippines, might have given rise to different perspectives, e.g., a more self-assured view in which it is assumed that religion, in general, and the Catholic Church, in particular, will retain their central position in society. The experience of Northwestern Europe, however, is different. What is more, we are convinced that far-reaching secularization and pluralization, and the concomitant shift towards a more fragile minority position of the main churches in this part of the world will become, in due 2 Staf Hellemans and Peter Jonkers course, the basic condition for most religions in other countries on the globe as well. Hence, we hope that the focus of this book on the highly secularized countries of Northwestern Europe will also be instructive to researchers working in other, at least for now, less secularized countries and continents. THE ‘POST-CHRISTIAN’ CONDITION From a Majority to a Minority Church Let us first look at the new structural position of the Catholic Church in Northwestern Europe. Due to the processes of secularization and (religious) pluralization, the Church, since about 1960, is evolving towards a minority church. Three phases can be distinguished: 1. Leaving aside the debate about whether secularization started already in or even before the 19th century, one can state that until about 1960, the Catholic Church was in many countries – like in Belgium, Austria, Italy, or Spain – the majority church, sometimes even occupying a monopoly position. In the Protestant countries with sizeable Catholic minorities – like the Netherlands, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, or the United States – a cohesive Catholic subculture, a so-called ‘fortress church’ (elsewhere labeled as ‘pillar’, ‘milieu’ or ‘Lager’), was built up after 1800. In both cases, the Catholic Church was leading in alliance with the elites of the country or subculture. The Church and (sub)society were regarded as more or less identical, an image cherished and idealized as ‘natural’ in Catholic circles. 2. After 1960, active involvement in the Catholic Church started to shrink rapidly, though most people were still influenced by Catholicism and regarded themselves, when asked in opinion polls, as Catholics. This development, resulting in a smaller core and a lot of people situating themselves between core Catholics and people without any religious affiliation, was captured by the Belgian sociologists, Jaak Billiet and Karel Dobbelaere, as a transition “from churched Catholicism to social- cultural Christianity.”1 Grace Davie labeled this state of affairs as “vicarious religion”: “religion performed by an active minority but on behalf of a much larger number, who (implicitly at least) not only understand, but, quite clearly, approve of what the minority is doing.”2 In 1 Jaak Billiet and Karel Dobbelaere, Godsdienst in Vlaanderen. Van kerks katholicisme naar sociaal-kulturele kristenheid? (Leuven: Davidsfonds, 1976). 2 Grace Davie, “Vicarious Religion: A Methodological Challenge,” Everyday Religion. Observing Modern Religious Lives (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), p. 22. The Contingent Meeting of a Catholic Minority Church with Seekers 3 this situation, the Catholic Church, although no longer master of the situation, was still in the center of (sub)society. 3. In the third stage, active involvement is declining further, but now the in-between group is also shrinking. Voas shows, using the data of the European Social Survey of 2002-2003 in 22 European countries, that “fuzzy fidelity” – the in-betweens with some basic knowledge of and sympathy for Christianity – do not constitute a stable and self-sustaining category.3 The middle category begins to rise when secularization sets in; it reaches a high point when the religious and non-religious are about equal in size and declines when the non-religious overtake in quantity the religious part of the population. Thus, the final result is a small and declining inner core and a somewhat larger, but also numerically decreasing, outer shell. The main church or churches have then evolved towards the periphery of society. They have, in the words of Hervieu- Léger, become “exculturated.”4 Taking the contribution of Loek Halman (see a.o. tables 2 and 4) as our guide in an attempt to interpret the situation of the main churches in Western countries on the basis of these three stages, we observe that the first two stages still apply to most countries. In a number of them, the main church still acts as the national church, with close links to the political, economic, and cultural elites of the country. In particular, some Orthodox countries in East and Southeast Europe (e.g., Greece, Georgia) are still in the first phase.