This episode traces how Quebec moved from a society organized by the Catholic Church to one that legislates state secularism. It opens on a problem of translation: laïcité is a French political concept with no exact English equivalent, distinct from the sociological idea of secularization.
From there it follows the Church’s role as “the state of a stateless nation” after the Conquest, the Duplessis years, and the Quiet Revolution of the 1960s, when Sunday Mass attendance collapsed and the state took over the Church’s role in schools, hospitals, and welfare.
It asks why historians now contest the “Great Darkness,” and why a debate once aimed at the Catholic Church has refocused on Islam and immigration. Guest voices include sociologist of law David Koussens, legal scholar Guillaume Rousseau, author Francis Denis, historian Xavier Gélinas, and sociologist Hicham Tiflati.
