The state religion is Greek Orthodox.  Up to 1864 the Rumanian Church was subordinate to the Patriarchate of Constantinople.  In that year it was proclaimed independent, national, and autocephalous, though this change was not recognized by the Patriarchate till 1885, while the secularization of the property of the monasteries put an end de facto to the influence of the Greek clergy.  Religious questions of a dogmatic nature are settled by the Holy Synod of Bucarest, composed of the two metropolitans of Bucarest and Jassy and the eight bishops; the Minister for Education, with whom the administrative part of the Church rests, having only a deliberative vote.  The maintenance of the Church and of the clergy is included in the general budget of the country, the ministers being state officials (Law of 1893).

Religion has never played an important part in Rumanian national life, and was generally limited to merely external practices.  This may be attributed largely to the fact that as the Slavonic language had been used in the Church since the ninth century and then was superseded by Greek up to the nineteenth century, the clergy was foreign, and was neither in a position nor did it endeavour to acquire a spiritual influence over the Rumanian peasant.  There is no record whatever in Rumanian history of any religious feuds or dissensions.  The religious passivity remained unstirred even during the domination of the Turks, who contented themselves with treating the unbelievers with contempt, and squeezing as much money as possible out of them.  Cuza having made no provision for the clergy when he converted the wealth of the monasteries to the state, they were left for thirty years in complete destitution, and remained as a consequence outside the general intellectual development of the country.  Though the situation has much improved since the Law of 1893, which incorporated the priests with the other officials of the Government, the clergy, recruited largely from among the rural population, are still greatly inferior to the Rumanian priests of Bucovina and Transylvania.  Most of them take up Holy orders as a profession:  ’I have known several country parsons who were thorough atheists.’[1]

[Footnote 1:  R. Rosetti, Pentru ce s-au r[)a]sculat [t’][)a]ranii, 1907, p. 600]

However difficult his task, Prince Carol never deviated from the strictly constitutional path:  his opponents were free to condemn the prince’s opinions; he never gave them the chance of questioning his integrity.

Prince Carol relied upon the position in which his origin and family alliances placed him in his relations with foreign rulers to secure him the respect of his new subjects.  Such considerations impressed the Rumanians.  Nor could they fail to be aware of ’the differences between the previously elected princes and the present dynasty, and the improved position which the country owed to the latter’.[1]

[Footnote 1:  Augenzeuge, Aus dem Leben Koenig Karls von Rum[)a]nien, 1894-1900, iii. 177.]