When in 1566 the war against the king of Spain began, catholics and protestants were still united in their goal of greater autonomy. However, starting with the capture of Brielle in 1572 and the torture and murder of 19 monks in that town, the martyrs of Gorcum, the war increasingly became a religious one. In 1579 the Union of Utrecht was signed, an alliance between the northern provinces. This treaty was supported by catholics, even though it ratified the prohibition of catholicism in Holland and Zeeland and guaranteed the catholic church a secondary position in the other provinces only. In 1580 count Rennenberg, the catholic stadtholder of Friesland, Groningen, Overijssel and Drenthe, disgusted by the cruelty of the protestants, returned to the Spanish side. This gave the protestants an excuse to outlaw catholicism wherever they seized power. Churches were handed over to the often small protestant minorities, while others were simply closed or given a profane use. Since catholics were excluded from important public functions, many rich catholics became protestants in order to keep their positions and maintain their social status. Only few people became protestant for theological reasons. Other catholics fled to the south, to areas still in Spanish hands. Ultimately, a minority of mostly poor catholics managed to survive the repression in the Republic. In the occupied territories in the east and the south protestantism was almost completely rejected. Attempts to settle protestants in these territories also failed. The famous Dutch tolerance of this time meant nothing more than that nobody was persecuted for his faith as long as he did not openly exercise it. The catholic mass, processions and pilgrimages were forbidden, and anybody found guilty of active catholicism was prosecuted and had to deal with severe punishments.
The northern provinces all managed to break free from Spain relatively early in the long war. For much of the time fighting was restricted to the southern provinces. During the Twelve Years Siege (1609-1621) some churches could be repaired. The church of Waalwijk, which was built right at the border of Holland (Republic) and Brabant (Spain), was rebuilt as a symbol of catholic status. Only the part on Brabant soil could be rebuilt though, as protestant Holland refused its cooperation.
When in 1648 the Peace-treaty of Munster was signed, about half of the total population of the Republic was still catholic.
In the Republic the catholics
met in houses and barns, the so-called hidden churches. In some
cases catholic noblemen opened their private chapels to
the believers. In cities like The Hague and Amsterdam foreign
embassies and consulates opened their private churches for the
local population. Priests from the south travelled through the land
to preach and rebuild the decaying catholic faith. In the occupied
part of Brabant catholics attended churches built for them just
on the other side of the border. In 1672 the situation improved
a bit, when troops of the French king Louis XIV and the bishop
of Münster almost defeated the Republic in an attempt to increase
their empires. In the territories the French and Germans managed
to capture, churches were temporarily returned to the catholics.
The province of Overijssel briefly rejoined the German empire.
Although the foreign troops were driven out of the Republic in
1674, the Republican regents realized that loyalty among the catholics
was in their own interest. Officially the ban on catholicism was
not lifted, but in many places the catholics did get the possibility
to buy the right to build churches, as long as they were not recognizable
as such. Towers were forbidden, as were in many cases tiled roofs.
Also the catholics were required to refrain from doing anything
that might annoy the calvinists, which seemed almost impossible
as the protestants were easily provoked. In Amsterdam (NH) one of the hidden churches
was this building at the beguinage (picture left), the H.H. Johannes
en Ursula, which was probably designed by Philips Vingboons, a catholic architect whose work was mostly restricted to private houses, due to his faith.
The catholics in Gorinchem built their church at some distance
from the street, behind a gate (picture right). Members of the
Old-Catholic church, the result of a conflict about the appointment
of bishops in 1724, built similar churches. This denomination
was especially strong in Utrecht and Haarlem.
Policies
could differ, however. In some conquered areas of the current
province of Limburg, catholicism wasn't banned at all. In Maastricht,
where the Republic was forced to respect the rights of the prince-bishop
of Liège, the four parish churches were divided between
protestants and catholics, each of the denominations getting
two. The picture shows the protestant St.
Jan, with next to to it the St.
Servaas, which wasn't a parish church and therefore remained
in catholic hands anyway.In some places churches remained catholic, other churches were used simultaneously by protestants and catholics. Occassionally the catholics built new churches to accomodate the growing parish, which in some cases were even paid for by the government of Holland, the most powerful province in the Republic.
The current province of Limburg is an exception to this rule. Much of this province remained under German or Spanish rule, which resulted in the construction of several Baroque churches, especially as part of a monastery, such as the St. Michiel in Sittard. Other Baroque churches were built in Maastricht, Houthem and Eys. While the churches in Sittard and Maastricht represent the Southern Netherlands (read: 'Belgian') Baroque style, the churches in Houthem and Eys are examples of the more moderate German Baroque. Of all these, the church of Eys is the only one that was built for a parish instead of a monastery or convent.
The only truly Baroque church outside Limburg is found in Ravenstein, the former capital of the Land van Ravenstein, which covered an area in the east of the current province of Noord-Brabant. After a period of protestant occupation it got a new catholic master 1630. In this area many religious orders found new monasteries and convents, while churches and chapels attracted pilgrims from the Republic. In the town of Ravenstein in 1735 the Baroque parish church of St. Lucia was built.
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