A Comparison of Church and Society in England and Spain during the nineteenth century

 Two Christian European countries with monarchies and parliaments would seem to be similar when contrasted with places that had no governments or obvious boundaries, but Spain and England were markedly different throughout the nineteenth century and this blog post explores some of the distinctions between them. At the start of the century England was protestant, largely Church of England with some Roman Catholics and Methodists, whereas Spain was Roman Catholic with few other denominations represented among its people. From 1837 England had Queen Victoria as its Sovereign and retained its status as a democratic nation. This was not true of Spain which suffered instability in the monarchy and the proclamation of the First Republic.

In 1814 the Spanish War against Napoleon ended and King Ferdinand VII returned to Spain being restored as the absolute monarch following a French invasion in 1823. When he died in 1833, his widow Maria Cristina became the Regent for his daughter, (later to be Isabel II) resulting in the start of the First Carlist War. Carlos was the brother of the King who had a claim to the throne. When this War ended Isabel II became Queen. She was deposed in the “Glorious Revolution” of 1868 and sent into exile.

Amadeo I was elected King, only to abdicate in 1871 with the announcement of the First Republic.  A coup ended the First Republic and the monarchy was restored under Alfonso XII. The century drew to a close with Spain losing Cuna, Puerto Rico and the Philippines to the United States in 1898 thus ending its dominance of the Americas. Political upheaval led to social and ecclesiastical turbulence: riots, food shortages and rural depopulation as people migrated to other European countries and to the north of Spain as industrialisation took place. Disease also took its toll:120 000 deaths in the cholera epidemic of 1885.

By contrast England retained a stable monarchy and whilst the political parties in government varied there was little political turmoil on the scale seen in Spain. In Spain the fortunes of the Church changed as the political map developed, some political and military leaders supporting the conservative way of the church whilst others desired liberalisation. In England much ecclesiastical discussion came about through the events before and after the Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829 and tensions continued for much of the century about the role Roman Catholics could play in public life. Methodism (founded by John Wesley) had been recognised as a denomination separate from the Anglican Church in 1795 and in 1811 the Primitive Methodists were founded, growing in numbers to 132 114 in 1860. Other developments brought benefits to people in England: Forster’s Act of 1870 enabled a national system of education to be established as Church Schools were not present throughout the nation. Even so most of the education that children received retained its Christian input via the local parish church and the clergy.

Considering that the UK and Spain have been partners in the EU in contemporary history and are now both liberal democracies it can seem hard to believe that their recent history of less than two hundred years ago is so different. Many of us have grandparents born in the nineteenth century- imagine the differences those people would relate from child hood depending on whether they were born in England or Spain.


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