Preliminary Programme

During the nineteenth century, Catholic poor relief played an important role in Belgium’s system of social care. As the turn of the century approached and the social question incited stark political conflict, the social role of religious institutions and religion itself were increasingly challenged. In the decades that followed, an extensive social organizational field developed, separated along ideological lines. at the same time, social legislation and public social provisions were expanded. This study examines the ways in which these socio-political transformations affected the practice of traditional Catholic charity, which remained a relevant source for material help for the poor as well as an important means for Catholics to express their devotion. The Society of Saint Vincent de Paul, the largest charitable organization for lay men in Belgium, serves as a case study. The Vincentians distributed material and moral relief through home visits to the needy. Their goal was to answer to and further propagate God’s love by helping the poor in their physical and spiritual needs. When First World War severely complicated the working of the organization and left the Vincentians incapable of proving their social relevance in this time of great need, the Society was left defeated. During the interbellum, the Society re-evaluated its own identity and tried to adapt to the needs of the time. The tensions between the Society’s spiritual nature and purpose on the one hand, and the demand for social utility on the other, profoundly shaped the Society’s identity, goals, and strategies during the first half of the twentieth century. Their discourses and practices offer a rich insight into the role of traditional Catholic charity in modern society, both as an expression of devotion and as a source of relief and guidance. (Show less)

The English Poor Law, which dated from 1601, was structured round the Church of England parish as a nation-wide unit of administration, managed by ratepayers and paid or elected officials. Although the Anglican church existed to promote the Christian religion, the Poor Law did not necessarily reflect Christian values of charity and generosity: indeed, it was frequently criticised for the reverse.
Despite sustained interest in the Old and New Poor Law, and interest in pauper perspectives, little attention has been paid to children’s positionality and treatment. The exceptions, by Alysa Levene (2012) and Alannah Tomkins (2006) focus on London, or towns such as Shrewsbury and Oxford. Jane Humphries’ (2013) focus was on workhouse experiences rather than a whole community. This paper will analyse the ways children and young people experienced Christian poor relief within a semi-rural community in the London hinterland, drawing on a rich cache of manuscript parish records.
The first part will review the provision of parochial poor relief for children and young people, from the founding of parish workhouses in 1723 and 1742 to the implementation of the New Poor Law in 1836 and 1840. There were also numerous endowed charities: indeed, in the 1820s, Walthamstow parish was criticised by the Charity Commission for supplementing the poor rate from charity funds. The paper will document the fluctuations of domiciliary relief, so that in 1826, a family of eight received only a sack of potatoes. Apprenticeship patterns will also be documented. Thus, evidence of seeking children’s perspectives on their placements, without the presence of masters and parents, suggests a determination to avoid abuse, as Honeyman (2007) argued.
The second part will consider the relationship between the Poor Law, as a moralising agent, and the family (or families), and attempts to keep “deserving” families together. Whereas London servants might go into the workhouse, have babies, and disappear (Hitchcock, 1997), news travelled fast in a smaller community, and in the 1750s and 1760s, parish officials ejected a single mother from the workhouse, and refused to maintain children there whose absent father was earning an adequate wage. Another single mother was allegedly left to starve to death in the 1810s, while from 1826, all the families receiving poor relief in Leyton parish had to attend church. Yet, some parents paid the parish to support their children in the workhouse, and homeless and “deserving” families might be accommodated in the almshouse. About one third of orphaned children receiving out-relief in the early nineteenth century were placed out with relatives.
The third section will also consider how exposure to Christian teaching might provide access to literacy skills, with religious books being made available to paupers, education in workhouse schools, and pauper children being taught to sing in church.
Overall, the paper will demonstrate an eco-system of different patterns of care and their limitations. It will thus enhance knowledge of the intersections of the history of children, poor relief, and the Church of England and attempt to recover children’s voices within these systems. (Show less)

The postwar period is often depicted as a period of profound change in Western societies, with the ‘golden sixties’ as its high point. Many of those changes balanced on the crossroads of the social and religious sphere, and were accompanied by discursive changes. In the field of religious poor relief, in particular, three important and rapidly successive changes in discourse occurred around the 1960s. ‘Secularisation’, first, became a widely used concept outside academia, shaping the reality of religious actors and prompting them to develop strategies to cope with the changing relationship between religion and society. ‘Solidarity’, second, became a dominant concept in Catholic social thought as a means to redefine the relationship between communities and the state. ‘Poverty’, third, occurred as an umbrella term for all kinds of previously distinct groups – e.g., unemployed, disabled and retired people – in order to bundle efforts and gain political power. These shifts in popular discourse highlight the changing role of religion in society and the increasing attention for poverty outside the Catholic sphere. It raises the question of how Catholic poverty actors reacted to the discursive changes in their field.
I will study how catholic poverty actors in Belgium incorporated or even instigated the new discourses on religion and poverty between 1950 and 1980. Belgium had a predominant Catholic identity. Because of this secure position, Catholic actors did not need to place themselves in relation to competing religions, and could concentrate on finding their own way to react to the societal trends that were reflected in the changing discourses. In order to get an overarching view of the Catholic poverty field, I will research the discourse of a variety of Belgian poverty organizations, all founded by a Catholic actors but with different dates of establishment. Through the analysis of interviews with founders/volunteers, statutes and published sources like magazines, books and pamphlets of the poverty organizations, I will investigate how and when discourses of religion and poverty started to shift in the organisations and if the way in which religion manifested itself in these organisations influenced the use of discourse. I will also briefly look into whether these narratives had the power to also intervene in the practices of the organisations. (Show less)