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Church and state in Croatia: legal framework, religious instruction, and social expectations

This chapter provides an overview of Church-state relations in Croatia since the collapse of communism. The focus is mainly on the general development of the legal framework, and on the introduction and development of religious instruction in the public schools. The issue of religious instruction serves to illustrate and discuss the main dilemmas about how to frame Church-state relations in the post-communist era, or more precisely in a country with a high level of religiosity, with marked social role of the Catholic Church, but also a country which opted for the separation of Church and state, for equality of all religions before law, and for respecting of freedom of thought, conscience, and religion. Therefore, the presentation of different aspects of religious instruction is followed by a summary of the public debates on the introduction of religious instruction in the public schools in the 1990s. In addition, the chapter touches social perceptions and expectations from religion in the public sphere, as the development of Church-state relations largely reflect the overall social climate in a country, an important part of which are social expectations of people from religions.

religion, politics, church and state, legal framework, religious instruction, social expectations, Croatia

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