Religion and national identity in post-communist Romania

Abstract

Throughout Eastern Europe, organized religion (and in particular Eastern Orthodox Christianity) has had quite a close relationship to the formation of local national identities. This relationship entered a new phase in the post-1989 period, as religious institutions had to adapt to the new realities of the postcommunist period. Religion, and Eastern Orthodoxy in particular, provided the means for a defensive response that is often an obstacle to the operation of democratic institutions and the adoption of EU norms and regulations throughout Eastern Europe. In this paper, we concentrate on the evolution of the relationship between national identity and religious institutions in post-1989 Romanian society. Under communism, in spite of all the restrictions imposed by the regime, ecclesiastical institutions maintained a level of autonomy and at least part of their credibility and continuity with their non-communist past. Consequently, after the collapse of the communist dictatorship, religion appeared to many as the only legitimate institutional and spiritual means available to fill the post-1989 ideological vacuum. Religious institutions had to define or redefine their social meaning to effectively address the changing set of contemporary social expectations.