Romania, Christianity in

Romania, Christianity in. Roman Dacia, which roughly covered the W. parts of the present Romania, may have received Christianity through Roman soldiers and colonists in the 4th cent. or earlier. Under Bulgarian rule its ecclesiastical affairs were placed under Constantinople, and its worship gradually took on an E. character. In the 19th cent. Romania gradually emerged as an independent State, and in 1885 the claim of her national Church for independence from the metropolitan jurisdiction of Constantinople was allowed. After the First World War (1914–18), Romania acquired Transylvania, where a Uniat Church had existed since 1700, and there were RC, Lutheran, Calvinist, and Unitarian minorities. In the 1923 constitution the Romanian Orthodox Church was recognized as the national Church. After Romania surrendered to Russia in 1944 the Romanian Orthodox Church was closely controlled by the Communist government until 1989, and other Churches suffered persecution. Only the Baptists increased. Since 1989 all denominations have enjoyed greater freedom. The Uniat Church, which had been forced to join the Orthodox Church in 1948, was reconstituted in 1990.