Organiser: The Research Group "Protestantism as a Minority Religion" (Luiss University)
Host: Luiss University
Postcode: 00198
City: Rome
Country: Italy
Takes place: In presence
Dates: 30.06.2026 - 03.07.2026
Deadline: 13.03.2026
Website: https://minorityprotestants.wordpress.com/
The recognition of religious minorities by political regimes does not always equate with true equality. History shows that it often comes with impositions, covert persecution, or the loss of certain privileges. This event aims to explore such moments of recognition, showcasing contradictory experiences of Protestant religious minorities with the state and the equalities and inequalities that originate from this dynamic across specific contexts. Contemporary struggles faced by minority Christian groups, such as those in northern Nigeria under radical Islamist attacks, or in North Korea and China under communist regimes, demand a reassessment of those dynamics.
(Un)Equals in the State? Minority Protestants and Their Recognition by Political Regimes
After decades of persecution and mistreatment, Pentecostals in Romania were officially recognised by the communist government in 1950. Before that recognition, in the inter-war period, their religious beliefs were deemed a threat to the mental health of Romanians and their citizenship was questioned because of their perceived unworthiness to embody Romanian identity. The Romanian communist regime ultimately granted Romanian Pentecostals legal status; however, this recognition came at a high cost. Research showed that, from their legal recognition in 1950 until the fall of the regime in 1989, the Pentecostal leadership was closely linked to and served the feared Securitate, the secret police (Croitoru 2010). Securitatea, which created the most effective surveillance control system in Romanian history, successfully infiltrated the Pentecostals. Italian Pentecostals had the same problems as the Romanians from 1938 to 1953, under both fascism and Christian Democracy (Hollenweger 1972 and 1997).
Nearly a century earlier, the oldest Protestant group in Italy underwent a similar process regarding their legal recognition, but under a different political ideology and with different outcomes. The Waldensians were persecuted for centuries. Legally recognised in 1848, they embraced liberal ideas and participated in the Risorgimento movement, which aimed to unify Italy. Their active engagement in nation-building following Risorgimento was based on the promises of a liberal regime advocating for freedom, although they were only ‘tolerated’ in the newly formed Kingdom of Italy in 1861. In the twentieth century, Protestants in newly formed Catholic Ireland underwent another process of recognition after the Partition in 1921 and successfully contributed to the pluralisation of the nation “just by being there” (Biagini 2025: 104).
In the Romanian and Italian examples, both minority groups shared a similar persecution story, but their recognition was set in a totalitarian regime and the other in a liberalising one, albeit under a highly restricted electorate with high property qualifications. Conversely, in Ireland, Protestants experienced a new status, finding themselves a religious minority in a Catholic country in which the Roman Catholic Church held much unofficial power despite its separation between Church and State. This event aims to explore such moments of recognition and invites proposals that showcase the contradictory experiences of Protestant religious minorities in relation to state power. Proposals which place them within their local contexts are particularly welcomed.
The event asks several critical questions:
1. What strategies did religious minorities use to attain legal recognition from the state, and what were the costs associated with these strategies? Were these groups truly achieving equality?
2. How did different political ideologies, such as communism and liberalism, affect their experiences of attaining equality?
3. What does State recognition signify for Protestant minorities, historically?
4. What did minority Protestants gain or lose from state recognition, and what hidden forms of inequality were masked by this formal acknowledgement?
5. What did they sacrifice or gain regarding their religious beliefs when they obtained legal equality with majority groups? How did their spiritual practices change as a result?
By examining these issues, the event aims to understand how minority religious groups interact with the state in moments of legal recognition and to explore the equalities and inequalities that originate from this dynamic across specific contexts. For instance, historical examples can further demonstrate that official recognition often incites resistance, leading to the emergence of dissidents who prefer to remain outside the state’s formal recognition. Contemporary struggles faced by minority Christian groups, such as those in northern Nigeria under radical Islamist attacks, or in North Korea and China under communist regimes, demand a reassessment of those dynamics under states that recognise them formally but not in practice.
Please submit an abstract and a short biography to Laura.Popa@gcsc.uni-giessen.de by March 13.
Programme
Confirmed speakers
Eugenio F. Biagini (University of Cambridge), Ireland and the Persecution of Protestants in the Italo-Iberian World in the 1950s
Karina Bénazech Wendling (University of Lorraine), Between Empire and Majority: Protestant Missions and the Search for Cultural Recognition in Ireland
Laura Popa (Justus Liebig University Giessen/Cambridge Centre for Christianity Worldwide), The Politics of Waldensian Women Schoolteachers Amid Covert Persecution of Protestants in Italy, 1860–1915
David Maxwell (University of Cambridge), ‘In from the Wilderness’: African Independent Churches and the Post-Colonial State in Zimbabwe
Debora Spini (New York University in Florence), A Minority Church in a Transforming Democracy
This event is open to seven more proposals.
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