Roman Catholicism in Norway

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Roman Catholic Church in Norway
Saint Paul Church Bergen Norway 2009 1.JPG
Saint Paul Catholic Church, Bergen.
Classification Catholic Church
Geographical areas Norway
Origin 934 A.D.

Roman Catholicism in Norway is part of the worldwide Catholic Church, under the spiritual leadership of the Pope, the Curia in Rome and the Scandinavian Bishops Conference.

There are, by May 2012, over 110,000 registered Catholics in Norway.[1] The Annuario Pontificio 2012, which gives the figures reported by the local church for 31 December 2010, indicates 84,499 Catholics in the Diocese of Oslo, 3,505 in the Territorial Prelature of Tromsø and 5,548 in that of Trondheim, a total of only 93,552. But there are also lots of Catholics who are not registered with their personal identification number and who are not reported even by the local church; the real number is probably about 230,000 Catholics, 70% of whom were born abroad.[2][3] That constitutes about 5% of the population, making Norway the most Catholic country in Northern Europe.

Contents

Structure [edit]

The country is divided into three Church districts – the Diocese of Oslo and the prelatures of Trondheim and Tromsø, and these three consist of 35 parishes. At least two more are about to come, a third one in the city of Oslo (St. Martin) and one in Valdres (St. Thomas, by now a chapel district), both of them in the diocese of Oslo. The Catholic Church is about to become the second biggest religious community in Norway by amount of registered members[4] - and with the unofficial number of 230 000, they already are.

Four religious orders have returned to Norway: the Cistercians, Dominicans, the Poor Clares, and the Trappistines. In 2009,[citation needed] monks from the Abbey of Citeaux dedicated a new monastery in Norway, naming it Munkeby Mariakloster. Trappistine nuns, likewise, bought land near the ruins of a pre-Reformation monastery on the island of Tautra in the Trondheim Fjord, moved to the site and built a new cloister, workplace, guesthouse and chapel, calling the new monastery, Tautra Mariakloster.[5] In addition to these four, 17 other orders are also working in the country,[6] for instance the St. Francis Xavier sisters, which is a unique order as it is founded in Norway. The Bishop of Oslo participates in the Scandinavian Bishops Conference.

There used to be several Catholic hospitals and schools around the country. There was also a Catholic orphanage in Oslo. Between 1967 and 1989,[citation needed] the Socialist government in Norway bought most of the Catholic (and other private) hospitals by force; the rest were condemned. Almost all of the schools were closed due to too few students, with only the schools in Oslo, Arendal and Bergen survived.

Nowadays, the Catholic welfare institutions in Norway are limited. There are no Catholic hospitals or orphanages remaining, though the number of Catholic schools are increasing.[citation needed] In addition to the three schools mentioned above, a new elementary school has opened in Bodø. There's a Catholic high school in Bergen opening in the autumn of 2012,[dated info] and an elementary school is planned for Drammen.[citation needed]

Fransiskushjelpen, a charity established in 1956 and run by Franciscans, remains active;[7] Caritas Europa has an office in Oslo.[8]

Origin [edit]

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The Catholic Church in Norway is as old as the kingdom itself, dating from approximately 900 A.D., with the first Christian monarchs, Haakon I from 934.

The country is considered to have officially converted upon the death of the king St. Olav at the Battle of Stiklestad in 1030.

The subsequent Christianisation took several hundred years. Largely the work of Anglo-Saxon missionaries, the Norwegian Church has been considered the only daughter of English Catholicism. Cardinal Nicholas Breakspear, later Pope Adrian IV, established a church province in 1152, the archdiocese of Nidaros (Trondheim). The prosperous years of the High Middle Ages were followed by decline for Church and nation alike.

From Reformation till 1843 [edit]

The Lutheran Reformation in Norway lasted from 1526 to 1536. Catholic Church property and the personal property of Catholic priests were confiscated by the Crown. Catholic priests were exiled and imprisoned unless they submitted to conversion to the Danish king's faith. Bishop Jon Arason of Holar, executed in 1550, was the last Catholic bishop of Iceland (until the establishment of the Diocese of Reykjavik in 1923). The Bishop of Hamar from 1513 to 1537, Mogens Lauritsson, was imprisoned until his death in 1542.[citation needed]

Many traditions from the Catholic Middle Ages continued for centuries more. In the late 18th century and into the 19th century, a strict and puritan interpretation of the Lutheran faith, inspired by the preacher Hans Nielsen Hauge, spread through Norway, and popular religious practices turned more purely Lutheran.

The Catholic Church per se, however, was not allowed to operate in Norway between 1537 and 1843, and throughout most of this period, Catholic priests faced execution. In 1582 the scattered Catholics in Norway and elsewhere in Northern Europe were placed under the jurisdiction of a papal nuncio in Cologne, however, with threatening punishment Catholic pastoring could not materialise. In the late 16th century, a few incidents of crypto-Catholicism occurred within the Lutheran Church of Norway.

The Congregation for the Propagation of the Faith, on its establishment in 1622, took charge of the vast Northern European missionary field, which - at its third session - it divided among the nuncio of Brussels (for the Catholics in Denmark and Norway), the nuncio at Cologne (much of Northern Germany) and the nuncio to Poland (Finland, Mecklenburg, and Sweden).

In 1688 Norway became part of the Apostolic Vicariate of the Nordic Missions. The Paderborn bishops functioned as administrators of the apostolic vicariate. Christiania (Oslo) had an illegal but tolerated Catholic congregation in the 1790s. Rests of Roman Catholic faith survived in remote parts of the Kingdom until approximately 1800.

In 1834 the Catholic missions in Norway became part of the Apostolic Vicariate of Sweden, seated in the Swedish capital Stockholm. In 1843 the Norwegian Parliament passed a religious tolerance act providing for limited religious freedom and allowing for legal non-Lutheran public religious services for the first time since the Reformation.

Since legalisation in 1843 [edit]

The first parish after the Reformation was established in the capital in 1843; a few years later Catholic places of worship were opened in Alta (Finnmark), Tromsø and Bergen. Whereas Norway north of the polar circle became the Apostolic Prefecture of the North Pole in 1855, the rest of Norway stayed with the Swedish vicariate.

When a new Norwegian Catholic missionary jurisdiction was established, it was not at any of the ancient episcopal sees but a mission “sui iuris” on 7 August 1868, created out of parts of North Pole prefecture and the Norwegian part of the Swedish vicariate. On 17 August 1869 the mission became the Apostolic Prefecture of Norway. On 11 March 1892 the Apostolic Prefecture of Norway was promoted to Apostolic Vicariate of Norway, with an altered name as the Apostolic Vicariate of Norway and Spitsbergen between 1 June 1913 and 15 December 1925. In 1897, the constitutional ban on religious orders was lifted, which in time led to the establishment of several communities and monasteries.

On 10 April 1931 the Apostolic Vicariate of Norway was divided into three separate Catholic jurisdictions:

  • Southern Norway: Apostolic Vicariate of Oslo (extant 1931–1953), upgraded to the Diocese of Oslo in 1953
  • Central Norway: Its jurisdiction (called Missionary District of Central Norway, 1931–1935; Apostolic Prefecture of Central Norway, 1935–1953; Apostolic Vicariate of Central Norway, 1953–1979) became the Prelature of Trondheim in 1979.
  • Norway north of the polar circle: Its jurisdiction (called Missionary District of Northern Norway, 1931–1944; Apostolic Prefecture of Northern Norway, 1944–1955; Apostolic Vicariate of Northern Norway, 1955–1979) now forms the Prelature of Tromsø.

Religious sisters working in hospitals and schools did much to overcome popular suspicions about Catholics. Sigrid Undset, a Catholic convert, and the Rev. Hallvard Rieber-Mohn, O.P., also contributed to this. Lutherans and Catholics were brought closer together in firm opposition to the Quisling regime during the German occupation (1940–1945).

In 1956, the final constitutional restriction on Catholics was lifted when Jesuits were allowed to enter the country for the first time since the formation of that order in 1540, though it is known that at least one Jesuit - Xavier Rénom de la Baume - was killed in action with French Alpine forces during the Battles of Narvik.

Catholic immigrants [edit]

The Catholic Church remained very much a minority church of a few thousand people right up to the decades following World War II. Around the country, the local congregations consisted of a few families each. However, with increased immigration from the 1960s onwards, the Catholic Church grew quickly: from 6,000 in 1966 to 40,000 in 1996 and to over 200,000 in 2013.[9]

At first, the immigrants came from Germany, The Netherlands, and France. Immigration from Chile, the Philippines, and from a wide range of other countries began in the 1970s. Among the largest groups are Vietnamese and Tamils. This development has further increased after 2008 with a high number of economic immigrants from Poland and Lithuania.[citation needed]

Members [edit]

Year Members[10] Percent
1971 9,366 0.24%
1980 13,923 0.34%
1990 26,580 0.62%
2000 42,598 0.98%
2010 66,972 1.37%
2011 83,018 1.68%
2012 102,286 2.04%
Municipality Catholics (2003)[11] Percent Catholics (2004)[11] Percent
Oslo komm.svg Oslo 14,908 2.8% 13,300 2.5%
Bergen komm.svg Bergen 3,873 1.6% 4,044 1.7%
Barum komm.png Bærum 1,816 1.7% 1,666 1.6%
Stavanger komm.png Stavanger 1,720 1.5% 1,568 1.3%
Trondheim komm.svg Trondheim 1,434 0.9% 1,416 0.9%
Kristiansand komm.png Kristiansand 1,251 1.6% 1,150 1.5%

List of Roman Catholic parishes in Norway [edit]

In the Roman Catholic Diocese of Oslo
In the Roman Catholic Territorial Prelature of Tromsø
  • Our Lady (Tromsø) from 1859 (Cathedral)
  • Saint Mikael (Hammerfest, including Saint Josef, Alta (1855)) from 1874
  • Santa Sunniva (Harstad) from 1893
  • Holy Family (Stamsund) from 1935
  • Saint Eystein (Bodø) from 1951
  • Christ the King (Narvik) from 1988
  • Holy Ghost (Mosjøen) from 2003
In the Roman Catholic Territorial Prelature of Trondheim

See also [edit]

List of Christian religious houses in Norway

Gallery [edit]

References [edit]

 This article includes a list of references, but its sources remain unclear because it has insufficient inline citations. Please help to improve this article by introducing more precise citations. (March 2013)

General references:

  • Catholic Church in Norway's website
  • Kjelstrup, Karl (1943). Norvegia catholica : moderkirkens gjenreisning i Norge : et tilbakeblikk i anledning av 100-årsminnet for opprettelsen av St. Olavs menighet i Oslo, 1843-1943 (in Norwegian). Oslo: Oslo apostolic vicariate. p. 418. 
  • Brodersen, Øistein Grieve (1943). Norge-Rom, 1153-1953 : Jubileumsskrift, 800 år siden opprettelsen av Den norske kirkeprovins (in Norwegian). Trondheim. p. 49. 

Specific citations:

  1. ^ http://dagen.no//Nyheter//Innenriks/tabid/248/Default.aspx?ModuleId=76896&articleView=true
  2. ^ Dagen - Kolossal katolsk kyrkjevekst
  3. ^ Vårt land - 200 000 katolikker i Norge
  4. ^ http://www.abcnyheter.no/nyheter/2011/12/09/snart-flere-katolikker-enn-muslimer-i-norge?page=1
  5. ^ Editors, " Arctic Contemplatives," America 1 March 2010, 4.
  6. ^ http://www.katolsk.no/organisasjon/norge/ordener
  7. ^ Fransiskushjelpen (Norwegian)
  8. ^ Caritas Norway (English)
  9. ^ Zenit: "The Church in Norway: Explosive Growth, Long Distances - Priest Explains Challenges and Priorities" by Jan Bentz February 26, 2013
  10. ^ "Statistics Norway – Church of Norway and other religious and philosophical communities" (in (Norwegian)). ssb.no. Retrieved 2011-12-09. 
  11. ^ a b Katolsk.no - Kommuner med minst 50 katolikker
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