The nineteenth century is often understood as being more rational than religious: utilitarianism, Darwinism, higher Biblical criticism, socialism, and communism combine to produce a picture of a society more concerned with knowing this world than anticipating the next. Nevertheless, religion was a central fact of life for many Victorians and had a central role in shaping Victorians' identities, both as individuals and as a nation. Religious identity and national identity were inextricably bound for those Englishmen and women who were members of the established Church of England.
This paper examines how Anglican travellers used their experiences on the Continent, and particularly their generally negative reactions to the Marian devotion they witnessed there, to shape their identities, both as individuals and as a nation, as rational, Protestant, and modern. Victorian travellers to the Continent frequently condemned Roman Catholic devotion to the Virgin Mary as pagan and superstitious, and as indicative of a servile religiosity. Marian devotion was seen as reminiscent of practices revolving around Greco-Roman goddesses, especially Juno and Venus. One of the underlying messages was that Roman Catholics were effeminate, for they prayed to a woman rather than to a man.
This paper will conclude by considering what Anglicans' reactions reveal about the construction of national identity in Victorian England. Recently scholars have paid increasing attention to questions of nationalism and national identity. Analyses of these questions in Victorian England, most notably in the works of George W. Stocking, Jr., and Adrienne Munich, generally focus on racial constructs of a national identity. This paper will argue that religion also needs to be explored in order to understand the Victorian attempts to construct a national identity. Reacting to Continental practices, these Anglicans defined themselves as a superior nation as they congratulated themselves that they were not members of a pagan, superstitious, irrational, and corrupt church that worshipped a woman instead of a masculine God.
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