[Cronos]

this was not unusual - Catholicism was a “state religion” for much of it’s existence in the world, Henry VIII duplicated it when he established the COE, and that was duplicated in places in the New World until our founders realized that state religions was its own form of tyranny.

Depends on where. In some strongly Catholic countries like Poland it wasn't...

[RFEngineer]

“Depends on where. In some strongly Catholic countries like Poland it wasn’t...”

The Catholic Church, before there were nation states was the center of political and religious power. “State religion” in the context of my post mainly referred to US States, post 1776.

[pierrem15]

Poland was a special case because the Roman church had to compete with the Orthodox church-- Polish kings were allowed to appoint bishops and services were held in Polish (or Old Slavonic at the time).

In the 16th century an official edict of toleration for all Abrahamic religions was issued, but it was repealed in the 17th century when Catholics were forbidden to convert to Protestantism (never read that it was actually enforced).

In any case, Poles have always had a strong anti-authoritarian bias.