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A state religion (also called an established religion, state church, established church, or official religion) is a religious body or creed officially endorsed by the state. A state with an official religion, while not secular, is not necessarily a theocracy – a country whose rulers have in their hands both secular and spiritual authority. Official religions have been known throughout human history in almost all types of cultures. They were adopted by most ancient states, both monoethnic and polyethnic, and observing them was a requirement made to all citizens, and especially public officials. Official religions justified and reinforced the type of government existing in a society. Sanctifying it as the most, or the only, correct (divine) one, they often put forward and/or supported ideas of its expansion to other lands, whether the latter already follow the same religion or, sometimes. not. As the term ''church'' is typically applied to a Christian place of worship and organizations incorporating such ones, the term ''state church'' is associated with Christianity, historically the state church of the Roman Empire in the last centuries of the Empire's existence, and is sometimes used to denote a specific modern national branch of Christianity. Closely related to state churches are what sociologists call ecclesiae, though the two are slightly different. State religions are official or government-sanctioned establishments of a religion, but neither does the state need be under the control of the church (as in a theocracy), nor is the state-sanctioned church necessarily under the control of the state. The institution of state-sponsored religious cults is ancient, reaching into the Ancient Near East and prehistory. The relation of religious cult and the state was discussed by Varro, under the term of ''theologia civilis'' ("civic theology"). The first state-sponsored Christian church was the Armenian Apostolic Church, established in 301 AD.〔 The Journal of Ecclesiastical History – Page 268 by Cambridge University Press, Gale Group, C.W. Dugmore〕 In the Near East and Middle East, many states with mostly Islamic population have Islam as their state religion in its Shiite or Sunnite variety, though the degree of religious restrictions on the citizen's everyday life varies. On the one hand, rulers of Saudi Arabia join secular and religious power in their hands, and Iran's secular presidents since the revolution of 1979 are supposed to follow decisions of religious authorities. Turkey, which also has mostly Muslim population, after its 1920ies revolution became a secular country, though unlike Russian revolution of the same decade, it did not made the country atheistic. The degree of strictness of official religions in modern world may vary considerably. Thus, while the monarch of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is still officially the head of the state church (in England only, because Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland are legally disestablished Anglican provinces and appoint their own bishops), everyday life of ordinary British citizens is not in total strict religious subordination and dependence on the state church, while in typical theocratical states it usually is. Israel is the only modern state officially embracing Judaism as its official religion, yet it has a republican form of government. ==Types of state religion== The degree and nature of state backing for denomination or creed designated as a state religion can vary. It can range from mere endorsement (with or without financial support) with freedom for other faiths to practice, to prohibiting any competing religious body from operating and to persecuting the followers of other sects. In Europe, competition between Catholic and Protestant denominations for state sponsorship in the 16th century evolved the principle ''cuius regio eius religio'' ("states follow the religion of the ruler") embodied in the text of the treaty that marked the Peace of Augsburg, 1555. In England, Henry VIII broke with Rome in 1534, being declared the "Supreme Head on earth of the Church of England",〔The headship was administrative and jurisdictional but did not include the ''potestas ordinis'' (the right to preach, ordain, administer the sacraments and rites of the Church which were reserved to the clergy) –Bray, Gerald. ''Documents of the English Reformation'' James Clarke & Cº(1994), p.114〕 the official religion of England continued to be "Catholicism without the Pope" until after his death in 1547,〔Neill, Stephen. ''Anglicanism'' Penguin (1960), p.61〕 while in Scotland the Church of Scotland opposed the religion of the ruler. In some cases, an administrative region may sponsor and fund a set of religious denominations; such is the case in Alsace-Moselle in France under its local law, following the pre-1905 French concordatry legal system and patterns in Germany.〔The concerned religious communities are the dioceses of Metz and of Strasbourg, the Lutheran EPCAAL and the Reformed EPRAL and the three Israelite consistories in Colmar, Metz and Strasbourg.〕 In some communist states, notably in North Korea and Cuba, the state sponsors religious organizations, and activities outside those state-sponsored religious organizations are met with various degrees of official disapproval. In these cases, state religions are widely seen as efforts by the state to prevent alternate sources of authority. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「State religion」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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