Constitutions and Catholicism in Argentina 1880-2023

Abstract

During the years 1880-2023 the relation between the Catholic Church and the Argentinian state was conflictive. Under constitutional clauses until the Constitution was reformed on 1994, on one part, the Catholic religion was protected and had a preferential position among other cults, and on the other, the Church was seriously limited by an institution: the patronato (inherited from the Spanish crown by the new states after their independence) known as the patronato that allowed the State to control her activities. Thus, within this constitutional frame tensions and dissents were frequent. Though the patronato ended with the Concordat between both political agents on 1966 it did not mean conflicts ceased to be. Discussions on abortion, same sex marriage and euthanasia emerged as issues to be held by the Church as new serious divergences. Nonetheless those quarrels did not distress the coexistence as they did in the past centuries