Towards a De-Christianized Society?

The question of how much Christianity (still) influences or ought to influence society has been debated many times since the establishment of the Federal Republic of Germany. In the Churches themselves but also in the media this issue has prompted various actors to expound their views. And in the Christian Democratic Union, debate on the ‘capital C’ is a firmly established though lacklustre ritual of internal party critique.¹ In 1990 the meaning of Christianity in society was not just subject to debate in the newspapers’ culture pages. Reunification brought together two states that were very different in religious terms. In