As a tourist in Prague, it is easy to assume that Christianity is prevalent within the city. A momentous statue of reformer Jan Hus looms over Old Town Square, while St. Wenceslas overlooks the entirety of the city center. At every turn there is a magnificent church, preserved and revered. However, the impression given by these details is an incorrect one. Christianity is, in fact, very much like the churches here. It is appreciated and preserved, but it is also hollow. The religion that truly thrives within the Czech Republic has a vested faith not in God, but the nation.
The Czech Republic steadily lost its religion in the twentieth century as its identity and people were routinely broken and pieced back together. It is a common among Czechs to believe that for the past 100 years, history happened to them. They were enveloped by the Austro-Hungarian Empire and subsequently freed only to be pawned in both world wars and overrun with communism until the revolution of 1989. Consequently, many abandoned their faith when they felt their god abandoned them to the whims of other nations and ideologies. Nationalism, heralded by men such as Václav Hanka and Tomás G. Masaryk, was to become the religion of the Czech people and remains so today. This is not to imply, however, that this religion is completely disconnected from its Christian counterpart. In the Czech Republic, they are inseparable.
This nationalism is rooted in the history that the Czechs generally agree was written by the Czechs themselves. That is to say, it is primarily based on a history that predates 1918 with some attention paid to those people and events that spurred the Velvet Revolution. This account of the Czech past, then, does not focus on the time when faith was suppressed or forgotten. Rather, it pays most attention to a time when Christian institutions and persons were distinct players on the national stage. Most brief recollections of Czech history are succinct timelines of the church within Bohemia. Major events include the Christianization of the region by St. Methodius and Cyril, the Hussite Revolution, and the achievement of religious tolerance under Joseph I. History here is a history of what Christianity has done, for better or for worse, to mold the Czech Republic. Nationalism, then, is a religion based on religion. The pride of this nation is what it has done for itself, which is subsequently what the church, its institutions, and its champions have done.
This being true, it is not uncommon to find a Czech who calls himself a Christian but has never attended a religious service, believed in the God of Abraham, or knelt in prayer. He is in reality professing himself to be a nationalist with deep respect for those religious peoples and institutions that have come before him and helped build the character of the Czech nation. If religion is defined as belief in a higher good, a power worth devoting one's life to, then religion is very much alive within the Czech Republic. It is only a belief in God that is extinct. Those churches that dot the streets of Prague aren't holy temples for the lord. They are shrines to history and tombs for Christianity.
This nationalism is rooted in the history that the Czechs generally agree was written by the Czechs themselves. That is to say, it is primarily based on a history that predates 1918 with some attention paid to those people and events that spurred the Velvet Revolution. This account of the Czech past, then, does not focus on the time when faith was suppressed or forgotten. Rather, it pays most attention to a time when Christian institutions and persons were distinct players on the national stage. Most brief recollections of Czech history are succinct timelines of the church within Bohemia. Major events include the Christianization of the region by St. Methodius and Cyril, the Hussite Revolution, and the achievement of religious tolerance under Joseph I. History here is a history of what Christianity has done, for better or for worse, to mold the Czech Republic. Nationalism, then, is a religion based on religion. The pride of this nation is what it has done for itself, which is subsequently what the church, its institutions, and its champions have done.
This being true, it is not uncommon to find a Czech who calls himself a Christian but has never attended a religious service, believed in the God of Abraham, or knelt in prayer. He is in reality professing himself to be a nationalist with deep respect for those religious peoples and institutions that have come before him and helped build the character of the Czech nation. If religion is defined as belief in a higher good, a power worth devoting one's life to, then religion is very much alive within the Czech Republic. It is only a belief in God that is extinct. Those churches that dot the streets of Prague aren't holy temples for the lord. They are shrines to history and tombs for Christianity.
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