ABSTRACT
This chapter introduces a line of research which developed over the last four years at the Meertens Institute in connection with post-doctoral project Detraditionalisation and the normalisation of alternative spiritualities in contemporary Dutch society. Secularisation in the Netherlands has been very much tied up with the depillarisation and subsequent unchurchisation of Dutch society. Increasing prosperity, geographical and social mobility, media participation facilitated a massive reappraisal of traditional notions and values, resulting in a profound detraditionalisation of Dutch culture. ZIN has provided a venue for major social debates on subjects like corporate responsibility, attended by representatives of the Dutch media, Christian trade unions and professionals from different economic sectors, or dialogue between Christianity and Buddhism, attended by religious intellectuals and leaders from the Netherlands and abroad. The notions of spirituality negotiated at ZIN attest to the fact that the Fraters have indeed taken recourse to subjective-life spirituality in their effort to salvage the essence of their religiosity in contemporary Dutch society.
