Written by Norwegian historian Frode Ulvund, this book discusses how attitudes toward certain religious minorities, particularly Jews, Mormons, and Jesuits, shaped national identity in Scandinavia from the end of the eighteenth century until 1960. While one does not typically associate toleration of religious minorities with this part of the world, the author shows the importance of including Nordic countries in research on the lasting effects of the Reformation in Europe. In Scandinavia, the Reformation led to the development of two strongly Lutheran states (Sweden and Denmark-Norway) whose policies, especially after 1800, toward the three religious groups reflected national sentiment and negatively impacted freedom of religion for these groups, contributing a vital chapter to European history in this area. The author aims to show how attitudes toward these particular religious groups—though they were different from one another—were important in the development of national identities, a crucial part of Nordic history after 1800.

In the development of this segment of Nordic history, the peoples of Scandinavia were transformed from existing as subjects to a Lutheran king in a society marked by inequality to living in a democracy with national identities where all citizens were considered equal. In other words, what we follow is the creation of three national identities and their aspirations for cementing national identity as a powerful and important part of society for all citizens. Ulvund convincingly argues that attitudes toward religious minorities played an important role in the development of these identities, more so in a political rather than religious way. In essence, the creation of these identities was bolstered by the labeling of individual members of the three religious groups as anti-citizens and as immoral in opposition to moral citizenship. They were, as Ulvund concludes, “a caricature of what it meant to be Norwegian, Swedish and Danish.” At the same time, the author demonstrates continually throughout the book how this discussion was also a part of a transnational debate.

To make the discussion more relevant to this journal, I would like to focus mainly on the chapter regarding the Jesuits. The chapter, which relies on earlier research, explains the role of the Jesuits in public and parliamentary discussions, mostly in Norway, but also in Sweden and Denmark. Essentially, the chapter explains that the Jesuits more than Catholics as a whole were looked upon as a political and moral threat to society. While this perception of the Jesuits mirrors that of early modern times, it did not take hold in an obvious way in Scandinavia until the end of the eighteenth century.

Ulvund begins with a discussion pinpointing the Jesuit threat in a Norwegian newspaper of 1786. The Jesuit order is accused of wanting the clergy to work independently of the secular authority in the state, especially if the state was an enemy of the Roman faith. The order was characterized by spiritual obligation and thus was considered as creating a dangerous state within the national state. Consequently, the liberal Norwegian constitution of 1814 included a ban on Jesuits (and Jews). The anti-Jesuit debate continued after 1814, holding that the order was bound by loyalty to work toward the interests of the papacy, creating cosmopolitan and immoral anti-citizens.

In Denmark and Sweden, more than in Norway, the Jesuits became a focus of discussion in the mid-nineteenth century in connection with a new papal mission strategy in the Nordic countries, backed by the Jesuits. Again, the order was seen as hostile to the state. This development was important in discussions at the Danish constitutional assembly of 1848–49, where a group wanted to restrict the new political rights of Lutherans. They lost, and the Danish constitution of 1849 included a right to leave the Danish Lutheran church for other religious institutions, even the Catholic Church. This right survives today.

In Sweden, freedom of religion found its way into society through the laws of dissenters (1860 and 1873). From 1873, Swedes were allowed to practice Catholicism, although with restrictions, as exemplified by the upholding of a Lutheran monopoly on education and schools, and a ban on cloisters. The discussions continued after 1873 with critique based on the idea of Catholicism as culturally un-Swedish and unpatriotic. In Norway, a new debate began at the end of the nineteenth century, here, too focusing on Norwegian national culture. Negative Jesuit stereotypes were implied by the word “Jesuitism.”

The history continues into the twentieth century. After World War One, a forceful renewal of anti-Jesuit discussions in Sweden and Norway ensued, Ulvund demonstrates. This backlash against the Jesuits was a reaction to an empowered Catholicism after 1919 that witnessed the strengthening of Catholic states and churches, and the weakening of Protestant states in Europe. In consideration of the Catholic history of Protestant churches, Catholic retrieving of Protestant churches was seen as possible. Jesuitism was said to be civilization’s most dangerous enemy and the antithesis of civic liberalism. This discussion ended in support of the existing ban on Jesuits in Norway and of cloisters in Sweden.

Even after 1945, you find anti-Jesuit discussion, now connected to the anti-fascist critique of Catholic fascist states during World War Two. The European Convention on Human Rights, including freedom of religion, from 1951, influenced this discussion, and finally, in 1956 the ban on Jesuits was abolished in Norway. In 1951, Sweden got general freedom of religion, but not until 1976 was it possible to open Catholic institutions without permission.

It is very interesting to follow these discussions in Ulvund’s book. These disappeared earlier in Denmark compared to Sweden and Norway. Ulvund writes that these two countries had problems with Lutherans organizing in free churches during the nineteenth century and in doing so, were disloyal to the state, religiously. This disorder and loss of control among the majority might explain the more critical attitude to the Jesuits in Norway and Sweden after 1849. In Denmark, a more successful opening of the church had succeeded in keeping the religious critique within the church and thus connecting it to the Danish national state.

Where there were fewer problems with the Lutherans, it looks as if it was easier to be tolerant of religious minorities and at the same time use Lutheranism positively in creating an important national identity. In my opinion, this might show that even if the anti-Jesuit discussion is identical in a transnational context, the force of the critique and the legal results may be explained by the character of the Lutheran community, but between 1780 and 1960 it was all about building national identities, as for the minorities inspiringly shown by Ulvund.