ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a concise comparative overview of the development of political Catholicism in Europe and the movement’s position on European integration. It presents short case studies of 15 different European countries which met the following conditions: first, a high percentage of Catholics among the population in 2010, and second, a certain prominence of political Catholicism in a given country, as identified in the academic literature. The chapter shows how the majority of political Catholic groupings support the process of European integration, while only in two cases Poland and Slovakia political Catholicism has acquired a clear Eurosceptic trait. It also shows that political Catholicism is supportive of the process of European integration, with two exceptions Poland and Slovakia, where political Catholicism acquired a clear Eurosceptic trait. French political Catholicism was instrumental in the development of European integration in the late 1950s and 1960s.
