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Secularization

Secularization is a process in which religious belief and practice declines, people become less oriented toward the supernatural, and churches no longer have the same power within civil society, particularly over the state. It is sometimes difficult, however, to distinguish secularization from personalization, in which religion becomes more private and less formal and institutionalized. The fact that Catholics in Ireland in 2000 were going to mass less often than in 1950 and were disobeying church teachings, especially on sexual morality, could be seen as a sign of personalization more than secularization. Indeed, it could be argued that at the end of the twentieth century Irish Catholics were returning to a type of relationship with the institutional church that was prevalent before the Great Famine. Nevertheless, whatever the process of change that is taking place, Irish Catholics are still very religious by Western standards.

Three-quarters of the people on the island of Ireland are Roman Catholic—over 90 percent of people in the Irish Republic and almost 40 percent in Northern Ireland. This is not just some nominal affiliation. Being Catholic or Protestant is central to personal identity—to how people see and understand themselves. In Northern Ireland, but less so in the Republic, religious identity is closely tied to social and political identity. But this does not seem to make Northern Catholics more religious. There is very little difference between Northern and Southern Catholics when it comes to mass attendance. However, given the specific context of Northern Ireland, and the lack of comparable data, this analysis of secularization focuses on the Republic of Ireland.

BEING RELIGIOUS

The level of orthodox Catholic belief in the Republic of Ireland is high. The majority (around eight in ten) of Irish Catholics accept the fundamental principles of their faith, such as belief in God, the divinity of Christ, and, in relation to Our Lady, the immaculate conception and her assumption into heaven. Similarly, over three-quarters (78%) believe in life after death, and seven in ten believe in miracles.

But what makes Ireland unique is the extent to which religious belief is put into practice. More than six in ten (63%) go to mass once a week. This is the one of the highest levels in the West, easily surpassing, for example, U.S. Catholics (43%), Poles (42%) and Italians (29%). There are also high levels of prayer (72% at least once a day) and reception of Holy Communion (42% receive once a week). There have, however, been changes in religious practice in recent years. The proportion attending mass once a week has decreased from 91 percent in 1973.

Another aspect that makes the Catholic Irish unique is the level of engagement in traditional religious devotions. Each year tens of thousands make pilgrimages to religious sites such as Knock, Croagh Patrick, and Lough Derg. Similar numbers participate in nine-day novenas to Our Lady in different churches throughout the country.

The Catholic Church still has a monopoly over the meaning of life in Ireland, particularly when it comes to life transitions. Young people may not be going to mass as often as they once did, but the vast majority of Irish Catholics are baptized, make their first Holy Communion, are confirmed (as Catholics), married, and buried within the church. These are still major social as well as religious occasions in Ireland.

BECOMING SECULAR

To understand the process of secularization, one must look beyond formal belief and practice to the extent to which people are oriented toward the supernatural and transcendental in their everyday life. There is plenty of evidence that the symbols and language of Catholicism—the statues, holy pictures, medals, greetings, and prayers around which daily life was once formed—are fading away. They do not have the same place in the rational lifestyle of modern bureaucratic society.

If being spiritual is one-half of the religious life, the other half is being ethical. Throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries the Catholic Church developed a monopoly over the rules and regulations of what constituted a good life and, thereby, how to attain salvation. What changed during the last half of the twentieth century was the nature of belief in the afterlife, the kind of behavior that was considered right and wrong, and the role of the church as a moral guardian.

Hellfire sermons have become a thing of the past. Only half of Irish Catholics believe in the devil and hell—in contrast to 85 percent who believe in heaven. There has also been a decline in acceptance of traditional church teaching, particularly in relation to sexuality. The proportion of people who believe that premarital sex is always wrong (30%) continues to decline. Less than half (42%) feel that the church gives adequate answers to moral problems and the needs of individuals.

For many years now there has been a decline in confession. In the 1970s almost half (47%) of Irish Catholics went at least once a month. This has declined to 9 percent. The change can be linked to Catholics distancing themselves from church teaching, particularly in relation to sexual morality. Young Catholics may be informed by church teaching, but they are increasingly making up their own minds about what is right and wrong.

While the church still has a monopoly over the religious field, it is rapidly losing its power in other social fields. Control of education has been crucial to passing on the faith from one generation to the next. Parents who had lapsed in their youth and early adult life were in the past easily persuaded to return to the fold once they had children. The development of multidenominational schools at primary level, and of community and comprehensive schools at secondary level, has facilitated disaffiliation from the church.

Health and hospital care is another field in which the church has lost its influence. In the past, people were often forced to use Catholic hospitals, or state hospitals whose medical ethics were essentially Catholic. It is becoming easier for Catholics to gain access to procedures such as sterilization and in vitro fertilization. A similar process is taking place in the administration of social welfare services. The state rather than the church now cares for the poor, the marginalized, and the disabled members of society. Social welfare is being disentangled from religious welfare.

The main reason for the decline in the church's influence in education, health, and social welfare has been the dramatic drop in vocations. In the 1960s the church could count on 1,400 new recruits to all forms of religious life each year. Now it has less than 100. There are still nearly 15,000 priests, nuns, and brothers, but they are aging rapidly. It is in this very real sense that the Catholic Church in Ireland is dying.

The church may have won the battle with the state over the Mother and Child Scheme in 1951, but it lost the war. The state has gained control of health and social welfare. It is slowly gaining control of education. Politicians gradually became less dependent on the symbolic authority of the church. The state pursued a different vision of Irish society based on materialism, consumerism, and liberalism. It has encroached increasingly into the family and sexuality, previous strongholds of the church.

The church has also lost most of the control that it once had over the media. At the heart of the modern mass media is a philosophy of liberal individualism that stands in stark contrast to the message of piety, humility, and self-denial which are the traditional hallmarks of being a good Catholic. The media have been to the forefront in leading Irish Catholics to see, read, and understand their world differently. There is a new self-confidence in Irish people, particularly among women. They no longer accept the traditional church image of them as virgins, servants, housewives, or chaste mothers. If there has been one major cause for the decline in the power of the Catholic Church in Ireland, it was the demise of the Irish Catholic mother. She was once the lynchpin in passing on the faith from one generation to the next. Now, like many others throughout the world, she is busy going out to work and consuming.

SEE ALSO Divorce, Contraception, and Abortion; Gaelic Catholic State, Making of; McQuaid, John Charles; Marianism; Mother and Child Crisis; Religion: Since 1690; Roman Catholic Church: Since 1891; Social Change since 1922

Bibliography

Flannery, Tony. The Death of Religious Life. 1997.

Greeley, Andrew, and Conor Ward, "How 'Secularised' Is the Ireland We Live In?" Doctrine and Life 50, no. 1 (2000): 581–603.

Hornsby-Smith, Michael, and Christopher T. Whelan. "Religious and Moral Values." In Values and Social Change, edited by Christopher T. Whelan. 1994.

Inglis, Tom. Moral Monopoly. 1998.

Kenny, Mary. Goodbye to Catholic Ireland. 1997.

Tom Inglis