Quote:
Originally Posted by Monolith
I've always had the impression that not only Swedes, but all Christian Scandinavians don't exactly have a strong connection with their Church. Is it a product of modern times, or does it have roots further in the past?
It is exactly the opposite in my country, where Church has been a safeguard of our national identity, culture and pride through centuries.
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You are right. The one explanation that makes more sense than any other explanation I know of is the one I already offered. But I will go into closer detail, because it is interesting to know some history behind it.
We had here a certain degree of compulsion surrounding the church. It was mandatory to attend mass, for example. When I was searching for more precise information about the date of installation of that order, I didn't find anything, but I will keep looking. What we can assume is that the arrangements surrounding the church became looser with reformation, in the sense that they became subordinated to the King. So it's quite reasonable to assume that reformation itself was a seed of what would come later. On the one hand, the closer ties with the state enabled such a thing as mandatory attendance and observance, while on the other it left the church in the hands of political power.
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But the change for Lutheranism was a slow process. During the 16th century, the King acquired the power to confiscate church property, to some extent at least. Later in the same century King Johan III tended toward reformed Catholicism, and his successor, his son with Katerina Jagelonica, Sigismund, who had become King of Poland, became King of Sweden also. In the same time, the Augsburgian confession,
Confessio Augustana, a Lutheran document, was accepted by the Uppsala church meeting as the official teaching in 1593. Sigismund's successor Karl IX was in his turn attracted by Calvinism, causing another setback for Lutheranism. So it was not until the 17th century that the church was dominated by "Lutheran orthodoxy", and that was also the time when the ties to the state became even stronger.
During the 18th and 19th centuries, the church was challenged by new movements from outside. First came pietism, which, if I'm correctly informed, was originally a movement within Methodism. Second came what we know in Sweden as "herrnhutism" which is a word formed from "Herrn Hus" (Mr Hus), the founder of the Moravian Church. So it was the Moravian Church that came to have influence in Sweden. There were conflicts that led to a split up of the Lutheran unity, and a number of "free churches" came into existence. Religious freedom was installed to a limited degree, and was initially reserved for foreigners under King Gustav III. From 1860 onwards it allowed also for Swedes and Geats to be members of a new denomination.
Svenska kyrkan - Wikipedia, den fria encyklopedin
I found another source on the concept of
folk church or
national church, which was what I was initially looking for to back up my presentation, since a historical review of that concept is also a detailed representation of the ominous turns that made the Lutheran church of Sweden into the disastrous policy bureau that it is today as "The Church of Sweden". I found an article published on the Catholic website with permission by the author, a polish immigrant by the name of Maciej Zaremba:
En fri kyrka del 2 Av Maciej Zaremba 991203
I'm using it for reference for Swedish readers, but there are surely more complete accounts in a good book, of which I don't know the title. Zaremba doesn't reveal his sources, but everything seems to be correct, although his perspective is not the same as mine.
The concept of national church came to Sweden from Germany in the beginning of the 20th century, but it was not until Einar Billing, bishop in Västerås 1920-1939, put stress on it, that things began to get serious. According to Billing, every nation had its own signum from God. Billing had an appealing intention, and it should be understood in the context of split up of Lutheran unity mentioned earlier on in my presentation. The church was no longer what it had been, and Billing wanted to revive it with a national turn, for the people, although it was a very fatal idea. Mass attendance was no longer mandatory, and people didn't attend in such great numbers anymore.
The Social Democrat Worker's Party (SAP, Socialdemokratiska Arbetarpartiet) came to power in 1933, and the stance of the party on religious freedom changed markedly after that. Arthur Engberg of SAP was now ecclesiastic minister. He was a cultural radical who, in the 1910's, had said that there could be no greater crime against the deepest and the best of a human soul than a state religion. But now that the SAP had come to power it was said that, yes, the state church shall be abolished, but in another time! What a U-turn!!!
That's the relatively late point at which I can say, with absolute certainty, that the church became corrupt, if not much earlier.
In 1961, Kjell-Olof Feldt of SAP - who later became minister of finance - said that anyone who wanted to marginalise Christianity/Christianism should guard the state church. You know... I often mention the SAP as the scoundrel for a reason in my posts. They took everything away from us, those lousy thieves.
With the millenium shift, the church was in official terms "separated from the state" but that's
a big lie, a scam and completely bogus, if you ask me. Simultaneously, the parliament legislated that "The Church of Sweden" must be "evangelic-lutheran, open, democratic, national and a church for the people". And that may sound as a step forward to some, but it's nothing but a scandalous insult of everything that is truly national. They promote sodomy actively, and it's just a question of time before they will force all the clergy to sanction the marriages of "homosexuals" in the name of God. At the same time, the state also controls what religious societies can be registered. Registered religious societies can receive massive funding, and the great lot of it goes to "The Church of Sweden".
Tuesday, March 4th, 2008
Re: On Christianity and Tradition [split]
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