The Congregations Law of 1875 is a legislative bill of the
Kulturkampf
In the history of Germany, the ''Kulturkampf'' (Cultural Struggle) was the seven-year political conflict (1871–1878) between the Catholic Church in Germany led by Pope Pius IX and the Kingdom of Prussia led by chancellor Otto von Bismarck. Th ...
period that abolished religious orders, stopped state subsidies to the Catholic Church, and removed religious protections from the Prussian constitution. It was based on similar legislation that had been voted in
France
France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...
a few years earlier.
Sixty-seven religious houses were dissolved within six months of the law's implementation and by June 1877, 189 had been suppressed. In the end, almost 3,000 religious men and women were directly affected by the Congregations Law, including the five drowned Franciscan nuns who were famously memorialized in
Gerard Manley Hopkins
Gerard Manley Hopkins (28 July 1844 – 8 June 1889) was an English poet and Society of Jesus, Jesuit priest, whose posthumous fame places him among the leading English poets. His Prosody (linguistics), prosody – notably his concept of sprung ...
’ “The Wreck of the Deutschland”.
However, were the law to have been implemented suddenly and completely, the Prussian government feared that up to 6,000 former nuns would be homeless and unable to find marriage or employment – a social problem even less desirable to the authoritarian state than the political influence of Catholicism.
As it happened, implementing the law in the
diocese of Hildesheim
The Diocese of Hildesheim () is a Latin Church diocese of the Catholic Church in Germany. Founded in 815 as a missionary diocese by King Louis the Pious, his son Louis the German appointed the famous former archbishop of Rheims, Ebbo, as bishop.
...
in the
Province of Hanover
The Province of Hanover () was a Provinces of Prussia, province of the Kingdom of Prussia and the Free State of Prussia from 1866 to 1946.
During the Austro-Prussian War, the Kingdom of Hanover had attempted to maintain a neutral position, alo ...
caused the closure of 36 schools run by religious congregations, requiring the state to provide education for 3,000 children. The costs were borne by the local community, a situation which was repeated around Prussia, making the laws broadly unpopular. Further, Catholic religious institutions did not comply independently with the new law, but had to be ordered individually, a process which slowed the implementation of the law significantly while raising the costs.
When a religious house was seized, more often than not all valuables had been hidden away, and sometimes it was found that the ownership of the property had been transferred into the name of a loyal Catholic layman, so that the law would not apply. Though it caused widespread hardship, the Congregations Law failed to advance the goals of the Kulturkampf.
References
*GROSS, Michael B. The War Against Catholicism: Liberalism and the Anti-Catholic Imagination in Nineteenth-century Germany. University of Michigan Press, 2004.
Catholic Encyclopedia - Kulturkampf{{Authority control
History of Catholicism in Germany
Kulturkampf
1875 in Germany