Bulgaria, a country with a Christian Orthodox majority
The majority of Bulgarians are Orthodox. In 865, Christianity became the state religion. The schism between Catholics and Orthodox dates from 1054. The fundamental differences lie in the fact that the Orthodox Church does not recognize the Immaculate Conception, rejects the dogma according to which the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son, rejects the existence of purgatory and does not submit to the supremacy of the Pope (who remains for them the Bishop of Rome). On the other hand, the Church is subject to secular life.
The Bulgarian Church is autocephalous, headed by a patriarch. The patriarch exercises supreme authority with the Holy Synod, which brings together the metropolitans, the title given to the bishops of the Eastern Churches. The latter are appointed for life in a diocese which they can only leave to be promoted to patriarch. The Church has three metropolises, those of Sofia, Plovdiv and Gotse Deltchev. It is in communion with the Orthodox Church of Ukraine and Italy. The dioceses are divided into deaneries with several parishes. Each parish is headed according to Orthodox customary law by a married priest, assisted in administrative tasks by a council of lay people.
The current Patriarch of the Bulgarian Church is the former Metropolitan of Rus, Neophyte. This close collaborator of the late Patriarch Maximus was elected by the council on February 24, 2013. He is an expert in liturgical chant and a recognized theologian having been for several years rector of the Theological Academy in Sofia, then dean of the Faculty of Theology at the University of the Bulgarian capital. He is a great connoisseur of inter-Orthodox relations.
On March 2, 2018, for the celebration of the 140th anniversary of the Bulgarian liberation from the Ottoman yoke, the Church welcomed the Patriarch of Moscow and all Russia, Cyril.
But what made an even greater impression was the visit of Pope Francis to the Holy Synod in Sofia on May 5, 2019. During an exchange between Patriarch Neophyte and Pope Francis, tolerance was on the agenda. Bulgaria was the fifth country with an Orthodox majority to receive the Holy Father of Christians. In 2002, John Paul II was the first pope to visit Bulgaria.
The Orthodox religion has played a major role in the formation of the Bulgarian nation since the Christianization in the 9th century. During the years of foreign domination, the Bulgarian Church remained the guardian of the national language and literature. The Orthodox religion is part of the Bulgarian cultural identity, as well as the Cyrillic alphabet. Moreover, baptism is the most important religious rite in the construction of the Bulgarian identity, which is why the communist regime introduced "civil baptism".
Islam, the second most widely practiced religion
The five centuries of Ottoman occupation of the Balkans allowed the expansion of the Muslim religion. The Turkish authorities introduced Islam, often by force, by building mosques and rehabilitating some churches into Muslim places of worship. Thus, as in Constantinople, many churches were transformed into mosques, and Christian artistic representations destroyed and replaced by Muslim iconography. However, Islam, which developed in the Balkan Peninsula, was strongly inspired by local cultures. Indeed, if the administrative authorities were in the hands of the Turks who came to settle in the conquered regions, the Ottoman power had intelligently favored an integration of the local populations, imposing the Muslim religion, but not refusing to modify its forms to adapt them to the natives.
After independence, a good number of mosques were transformed into churches, some of them finding there their first destiny. In the 1980s, the Communist regime launched a major campaign against the Muslim religion, which drove a large number of Muslims into exile, particularly to Turkey.
Currently, Bulgaria has about 900,000 Muslims of Turkish origin, concentrated mainly on the border with Turkey, in the Rhodopes and on the coast between Varna and Bourgas. It is advisable to add the descendants of Tatars as well as Circassians, these famous Tcherkesses who, fleeing in the XIXth century the advance of the Russian troops in the Caucasus, came to constitute under Turkish command bands of irregulars (the famous bachi-bouzouks of the captain Haddock) to repress in blood the Bulgarian uprisings. The Pomaques, numbering 300,000, are Bulgarian-speaking Muslims, descendants of ethnic Bulgarians converted to Islam in the 15th century.
Catholicism
Catholicism, which was practically non-existent for several centuries, was introduced into Bulgaria during the period of Ottoman rule by Saxon merchants who traded with the Empire. From the north, Catholic movements spread throughout Bulgaria and, although it has always been a strong minority religion, there are a number of Catholic churches in the main cities of Bulgaria. The Assumptionist brothers opened the St. Augustine College, a secondary school, in Plovdiv in 1884.
Judaism
Bulgaria has long been home to a Jewish community. It even had a Jewish queen, Queen Sara, wife of King Ivan Alexander, who ruled in Veliko Tarnovo from 1331 to 1371. From this union was born the last king of medieval Bulgaria, Ivan Chichman. In the Middle Ages, Jews from Central Europe, Ashkenazim, came to Bulgaria. During the time of the Ottoman Empire, the country gave refuge to several Jewish communities, notably to those driven out of Spain by Isabella the Catholic.
In the 17th century, 15,000 Jews lived in Sofia. In the 19th century, there were about 30 Jewish worship buildings for the various communities, mainly Ashkenazi, which had settled in the large cities. Some synagogues were built in Sofia, Samokov, Plovdiv and Vidin.
After the liberation from the Ottoman yoke, the Bulgarian authorities always showed tolerance towards the Jewish community, which lived fully integrated, practicing the same trades. As mentioned above, Bulgaria, although on the side of Germany during the Second World War, never agreed to the deportation of Jews, and many Bulgarian politicians, intellectuals and churchmen protested against anti-Semitic discrimination. Many of them managed to leave for Israel at that time.
The largest synagogue in the Balkans is located in Sofia, near the central market. It was built by the architect Friedrich Grünanger and inaugurated on September 9, 1909 with the presence of Tsar Ferdinand.
The cult of Douvonism and other religions
Around 1918, the theologian Pierre Deunov created a movement that later took his name. His group is in fact a sect that believes in the reincarnation of souls and in the spirituality of objects. This "religion" attaches great importance to the sun and organizes invocation dances that will surprise and amuse curious tourists. It should be noted that the sect has found followers in the West, like the late Paco Rabanne, for example.
Other religious minorities are present in Bulgaria: Protestants, Methodists, Baptists, Congregationalists, Pentecostals, Adventists. These movements appeared in the 1980s, but the number of their followers remains anecdotal.
Concerning the superstitions of the Bulgarians, when they drink a toast, they have to look into each other's eyes when toasting. When they lose a loved one, they say the words "Bog da go prosti","God rest his soul", during the funeral. To avoid bad luck from any event, touching wood, as we also do, is a common practice.
