engleski

Climate for alternative religiosity in the Republic of Croatia

Our questions deal with the contents of alternative religiosity without specifying any particular movement. The results confirm that this was a good decision on our part. Based on these results, we can say that the climate for alternative religiosity is positive. In fact, there is already a lot of knowledge of alternative religiosity present among the Croatian population. The fact that most people are unaware that this knowledge can be categorised as spiritualism, New Age, Gnosis, etc. is not of vital significance to our present consideration. This knowledge coexists with Catholic beliefs. For example, belief in reincarnation is at a level of 15% and this percentage does not decrease with church attendance. It is highly unlikely that the Church will excommunicate anyone due to heresy. The likelihood is also small that those whose beliefs are closer to alternative religiosity will abandon the Church in the near future. With its tolerance of alternative beliefs, the Catholic Church absorbs some of the force of the potential of these beliefs to lead church members to form alternative religious movements. However, the Church will probably have to distance itself from some of this knowledge and channel it in acceptable directions. In future, we can expect a high level of belonging and a high level of religiosity. A significantly lower level of orthodoxy can be expected because normative Catholic knowledge will be integrated with various aspects of alternative religiosity. Development of the situation will depend significantly on the attitude which the Catholic Church will adopt towards moral permissiveness and orthodoxy. If the Church’s attitude will remain tolerant, there will be no reason for formal abandonment of the Church. In contrast, we can expect a clear distancing from the Church of a portion of the population of church members whose beliefs are closer to alternative religiosity than to those of the Catholic Church. We must also consider the strong influence of the Catholic Church on the formation of national identity, which will remain significant for some time yet. Its position will slow down the process of members abandoning the Church.

alternative religiosity; spiritualism; New Age; Gnosis; occultism; syncretism

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