The church and the process of secularization in the modern uruguay (1859-1919)

Abstract

Uruguay is characterized itself by, among other things, to be an eminent secular country. The Constitution of 1917 established the absolute separation of the Church and the State and it put an end to a long process of secularization initiated in 1859. The Church lost its socio-cultural preponderance, and from the State was articulated an imaginary collective devoid of any religious point of reference. In this article, I expect to analyze the unsuccessful fight of the Church to preserve its socio-cultural influence and the strategies structured in several fronts –pastoral, formative, journalistic, political, catechism educational– to avoid what in the time, was denominated the «Dechristianization». This approach leads to explain the original features of the uruguayan Church and the character of its relationships with the society and the State.