Would it be possible to have a Christian Republic in present-day Europe similar to OTL Iran?

alter

How do you think would it be possible to have a Theocracy in present-day Europe that is about as strictly Christian as present-day OTL Iran is Islamic?

-Obviously it wouldn't be Democratic, so it wouldn't be a member of the EU.

-It would be strongly Patriarchal and discriminatory towards women.

-Public indecency (for example couples kissing or women wearing tight jeans instead of long skirts) would be punished by lashings or other corporal or shaming punishments by a dedicated "Religion Police".

-Homosexuals would be executed or be forced to have an SRS operation to become the opposite gender.

-Media would be full of Christian religious propaganda, with a dose of Nationalism mixed in.


I think candidate countries could be Italy (home of Rome and the Vatican), Poland (one of the most devout Catholic countries) and Romania (the most religious country of Europe).
 

Deleted member 6086

This sounds very much like Francoist Spain and Salazarist Portugal, to be honest, if a bit further on the fundamentalist scale. Your scenario would require those regimes living on beyond their founders, and also focusing more on religion as a social unifier (even more so than they did historically).
 

CaliGuy

Banned
alter said:
How do you think would it be possible to have a Theocracy in present-day Europe that is about as strictly Christian as present-day OTL Iran is Islamic?

-Obviously it wouldn't be Democratic, so it wouldn't be a member of the EU.

-It would be strongly Patriarchal and discriminatory towards women.

-Public indecency (for example couples kissing or women wearing tight jeans instead of long skirts) would be punished by lashings or other corporal or shaming punishments by a dedicated "Religion Police".

-Homosexuals would be executed or be forced to have an SRS operation to become the opposite gender.

-Media would be full of Christian religious propaganda, with a dose of Nationalism mixed in.


I think candidate countries could be Italy (home of Rome and the Vatican), Poland (one of the most devout Catholic countries) and Romania (the most religious country of Europe).
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What about somehow having Savonarola's state in Florence survive and eventually become a fundamentalist Christian republic? Would that work for this?
 
SanMan64

SanMan64

Banned
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Modern (western) Europe is too progressive to have a reactionary theocracy rise up in it. Maybe in Eastern Europe if you can butterfly the Iron Curtain, but modern European Christianity of any denomination is too liberal to be compared to Iran's Islamic theocracy.
 
Ilúphatar

Ilúphatar

It would be extremely unlikely, primarily due to the nature of Christian doctrine relative to Islamic tradition.

We can pretty much rule out Protestantism - bourne of the ability to directly study the Bible and challenge repressive principles with scripture, a Protestant theocracy would likely face too much internal criticism to survive (though Protestant denominations that cling to more Catholic beliefs such as High Anglican could, perhaps). That leaves Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy - I would suggest Orthodoxy as the more likely candidate, as a Catholic repressive theocracy would be unlikely to receive support from a Pope with more mainstream Catholic views. Russian and Greek Orthodoxy are less centralised (the Patriarch of Constantinople is not equivalent to the Pope in Rome) than Roman Catholicism and the various regions that adhere to Orthodoxy are not so uniform in their beliefs, and are less likely to interfere with those of others. A surviving Russian Empire could be a possibility.

If you feel like extending 'Europe' to the Levant, a Christian theocracy in Lebanon or in a Syrian splinter state under a Syriac or Aramaean Church could be possible if an opportunity is given to the Christians there to gain power and a demographic advantage. It would be difficult, however.
 
Zagan

Zagan

Donor
There are two theocracies in present day OTL Europe: The Vatican City (Holy See) and the Holy Mountain Athos (Ayios Oros).
 

Milo

Maybe if whatever reason Tito's Yugoslavia collapses maybe a reactionary turned Theocracy emerges in Serbia
 

Riain

Banned
What about a revived Byzantium Greece, with the Emperor both head of state and head of the Church. With a constitution like Imperial Germany with the Emperor having a lot of control over the executive branch of government you could get the government acting in the interests of the church as well as the state.
 

Anarch King of Dipsodes

alter said:
How do you think would it be possible to have a Theocracy in present-day Europe that is about as strictly Christian as present-day OTL Iran is Islamic?
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Not with any PoD in the 20th Century, I think.

I think candidate countries could be Italy (home of Rome and the Vatican)...
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And a country with a very long tradition of resisting the political ambitions of Popes, including invading the Papal States in 1860 and 1870. That was before a big slice of Italians turned socialist or Communist and dropped religion.

No other Catholic country is possible, because the Church would object. The Church might not object to enforcement of Catholic belief and morality, but it would object to the Church in a country taking political power. Not on principle, but because of the damaging reaction everywhere else. And in that country - when the clerical regime fell politically, as sooner or later it must, it would ruin the Church there.

Iran is a peculiar case, having a local (autocephalous) established clergy.

The other great factor is that nowhere in Christian Europe since 1900 has there been religious fervor like that in Iran.
 
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Zagan

Zagan

Donor
Anarch King of Dipsodes said:
The other great factor is that nowhere in Christian Europe since 1900 has there been religious fervor like that in Iran.
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Actually, I think that I can find one example of completely out of the ordinary religious fervour in 20th century Europe: Interbellic Romania with the mystical Legionary Movement of Corneliu Zelea Codreanu.

Just keep Codreanu alive, get them from 16% to about 40% and it may just fit the bill.
 

Hamersley Macdonnell II

Banned
Uldrich Zwingli's Christlische Burgrecht (Christian Confederation) that existed between 1529-1535 in areas encompassing parts of modern Swizerland and France, was intended to be a Calvinist Christian theocracy. Zwingli's Zurich already was during his activity there, as was Calvin's Geneva. If CB survived, it probably would still be theocracy.
 
Gonzo

Gonzo

Alexander the Average said:
Maybe Ireland, given the influence of the Catholic Church in the Republic, and the religious sectarianism in the north.
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This - basically Dev refused requests to have Catholicism become the state religion - either have him go down his road to Damascus of cultural conservatism, have someone else within FF come to power, or have Cosgrave remain in power and continue his rapprochement with the Church - then such an idea could be possible.

I would add that Ireland is unlikely to have a situation in Ireland where women are punished for showing ankle - yes have extremely conservative social and moral values, but I think that even that is a stretch too far. I would say that Francoist Spain is perhaps the closest to such a 'Christian Iran' that is possible in Europe without drastic changes from a PoD.
 

Halagaz

Zagan said:
Actually, I think that I can find one example of completely out of the ordinary religious fervour in 20th century Europe: Interbellic Romania with the mystical Legionary Movement of Corneliu Zelea Codreanu.

Just keep Codreanu alive, get them from 16% to about 40% and it may just fit the bill.
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I remember reading that Codreanu's 16% was really 20-25% of the vote, but artificially reduced through election fraud.

Having said that, would the Legionary movement really go in for "morality police" and that sort of thing? Their mysticism was strongly religious, but did not focus on strict theology and rigid enforcement of "respectable" behavior. That sounds like something that would be very low on Codreanu's list of priorities - that is, if he gets the idea and decides to bother with it at all.
 
Zagan

Zagan

Donor
Halagaz said:
I remember reading that Codreanu's 16% was really 20-25% of the vote, but artificially reduced through election fraud.
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Maybe.

Halagaz said:
Having said that, would the Legionary movement really go in for "morality police" and that sort of thing? Their mysticism was strongly religious, but did not focus on strict theology and rigid enforcement of "respectable" behavior. That sounds like something that would be very low on Codreanu's list of priorities - that is, if he gets the idea and decides to bother with it at all.
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Well, the Legion did reprimand its own members for adultery and other sins so I believe that it may be possible to get to some other extreme behaviour in this direction.
 
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