Rise of Empires: Spain.

Chapter 567 Language and Religion

Shortly after the Paris Peace Conference, the Spanish government rewarded those who had contributed to the war effort.

The enfeoffment ceremony for the new nobles and the awarding of medals to soldiers with military merit were held only one day apart, and the two grand events plunged the whole of Spain into a frenzy of celebration.

From Asturias to Seville, from Galicia to Barcelona, ​​cheers and celebrations were everywhere, and national cohesion and identity were greatly strengthened at this moment.

As a famous British saying goes, even the poorest workers in East London would involuntarily puff out their chests with pride when they thought of the wealth and industry of the British Empire.

This is exactly the situation in Spain today. With Spain demonstrating its formidable military strength, almost all Spaniards are proud of their country and genuinely identify with the House of Savoy and Carlo's rule.

Following the investiture and investiture ceremonies, numerous demonstrations erupted in various Spanish cities.

Unlike ordinary marches, these marches were not against the government, but to celebrate Spain's victory in the World War and to celebrate Spain's strength.

Spain, of course, would not prevent such demonstrations. Carlos was not a dictator, and naturally, he would not, like those in dictatorial countries, ostensibly grant the people the right to demonstrate, but in reality, forcefully suppress any signs of such demonstrations.

For Carlos, the spontaneously organized demonstrations by the people were a way to express their attitudes, which would be of great help to the Spanish government's future decisions and to the future king of Spain.

Of course, all of this is based on the premise that the Spanish people spontaneously organized the marches, rather than being secretly planned by certain forces.

This is a completely different situation. Carlo allows Spaniards to voice their opinions within reasonable limits, but he will never allow certain forces with ulterior motives to exploit Spaniards and threaten Spain's peaceful and stable political environment.

Given that the demonstrations were taking place across the country, such large-scale protests posed significant security risks. While the Spanish government did not prevent the demonstrations, it ordered state and municipal governments to deploy more police to maintain order and prevent security incidents.

Some people were initially very worried about the arrival of a large number of police officers. However, after they realized that the police were only there to maintain order and would not stop their march, they were completely relieved.

The related marches lasted for several days, and the Spanish government intended to spread this joyous sentiment throughout the country, allowing all Spaniards to celebrate the victory in this grand war together.

Although the whole country was immersed in joy, the war brought a lot of casualties and grief, and the sacrifices made by soldiers and people from all walks of life in the war must be remembered.

To commemorate the soldiers who died for their country in the World Wars, Carlo ordered the construction of a large cemetery around the Iberian Cathedral and a monument to heroes in the center of the cemetery.

Soldiers' remains can be buried in cemeteries and their names can be engraved on monuments, provided the families of the fallen soldiers are willing.

The prayers for these fallen soldiers were performed by the Archbishop of Iberia and many priests. This reflects the importance Spain places on these fallen soldiers, as praying for the dead is one of the most important parts of a funeral, and the higher the status of the person offering the prayer, the more solemn the funeral.

Building special cemeteries to bury these national heroes is just the beginning. In the future, Carlo also plans to organize events to commemorate national heroes from time to time, allowing Spanish students to take turns visiting the heroes' monuments and praising the achievements of these heroes for generations to come.

A great nation must have one prerequisite: the ability to remember and celebrate the achievements of its heroes. If a nation can forget even the deeds of its heroes, it can never be considered great.

Carlo hopes that the deeds of these heroes will inspire more Spaniards, igniting a passion in all Spaniards so that they can fight for their country when it needs them.

Speaking of the Iberian Cathedral, it has now become a landmark building in Spain and the core of the Spanish Catholic Church.

Decades ago, the Church still wielded considerable power in Spain. Because of Spain's remoteness, religion held significant influence, sometimes even rivaling the monarchy.

When Carlos first became King of Spain, the Spanish Catholic Church possessed a large number of clergy and land, making it a powerful force in Spain besides the aristocratic class.

Fortunately, then-Prime Minister Primo controlled the army, and through a series of reforms related to the church, the Spanish Catholic Church no longer wields such exaggerated influence; it is now merely one of the means by which the monarchy governs the country.

The Catholic Church of Spain is the highest religious authority in Spain and the only officially recognized church in the country. While Catholicism is the state religion of Spain, other Christian denominations are also recognized, but not officially promoted.

All religions other than Christianity are not recognized by the Catholic Church. Another major task of the Catholic Church is to help the Spanish government to incestuously promote religions throughout the country and ensure that no religion other than Christianity emerges.

Of course, Spain's control over religion is not as strict nowadays. Even non-Christians, as long as they don't do anything heinous, are not subject to mass arrests by the government.

Even people without faith are recognized; however, given the prevalence of Christianity in Europe, people without faith and pagans are ultimately a minority.

The head of the Spanish Catholic Church was the Archbishop of Spain, who has now been elevated to the Archbishop of Iberia.

Although there is not much difference between Spanish Catholicism and mainstream European Catholicism, there are still significant differences in subtle ways.

In mainstream European Catholicism, bishops are generally elected by the religious community, while the Archbishop of Iberia in Spain is personally appointed by the King of Spain for a lifetime term.

The current Archbishop of Iberia is named Christian, a confidant chosen by Carlo within the church, and is quite loyal to Carlo.

While acknowledging the Church's role in national governance, Carlo was also aware of its influence. For the sake of peace and stability in Spain, the Church's power must be firmly held in the king's own hands.

Spain's current political structure is indeed very well-established. With the Archbishop of Iberia, the highest leader of the Spanish Catholic Church, appointed by Spain, the Catholic Church is firmly in the hands of the King.

Today, the Spanish Church has a deep partnership with the government, having sold most of its land to the government in exchange for funds to build church schools.

These church schools are mainly divided into two categories: one part is theological schools, and the other part is language schools.

The former mainly trains clergy for the Spanish Catholic Church, since the Church needs a constant influx of talent to grow and maintain its size.

While the latter also trained personnel for the church, its primary purpose was to help Spain achieve linguistic and religious unification.

Many Moroccans in the Morocco region gradually mastered Spanish and converted to Catholicism through language schools established by the Spanish Catholic Church.

Thanks to the vigorous efforts of the Spanish Church, countless religious schools now exist throughout Spain, successfully spreading Catholicism throughout the country. Of course, the Spanish language also spread along with Catholicism. The subtle influence of Spain on Portugal had already begun after Spain's unification with Portugal.

In some news reports and government documents, Portuguese is not referred to as Portuguese, but rather as a dialect version of Spanish.

To put it simply, Spain classifies both Spanish and Portuguese as Spanish, making standard Spanish the official language of the country, and regarding Portuguese as a dialectal variation of standard Spanish.

Indeed, there isn't a significant difference between Spanish and Portuguese. Portuguese people can understand Spanish, and Spanish people can understand a general portion of Portuguese.

For the Portuguese, it only takes a short time to learn Spanish, which is also a contribution to language unification.

The news that Portuguese was a dialect of Spanish, which appeared frequently in related newspaper articles, quickly attracted the attention of the Portuguese.

Although some Portuguese people expressed their dissatisfaction, this dissatisfaction did not have any impact on the country because Spaniards still constituted the majority of the population.

Under the long-term influence of public opinion, many Portuguese people have indeed come to believe this view. After all, it's truly impossible to explain the high degree of similarity between Spanish and Portuguese; they do indeed sound like dialects and standard Mandarin.

This is similar to how the British and Americans both speak English, but their accents can differ.

Doesn't Americans speak English? It's just that Americans call their English "American English" to better distinguish it from standard English, but it's still English in practice.

If Portuguese is considered part of Spanish, then the language standardization in Spain is currently very high. To pressure the Portuguese to master Spanish quickly, Spanish-owned factories in Portugal have adopted a policy of paying higher wages to Portuguese workers who speak Spanish.

Although mastering Spanish is not a strict requirement, most Portuguese people are still willing to spend some time learning it.

After all, if they can speak Spanish, their income will be much higher.

Moreover, the explanation given by the Spanish factory owner was quite reasonable: Portuguese people who speak Spanish can improve work efficiency and reduce communication problems with factory managers, which alone is enough to justify paying them high salaries.

For those who don't speak Spanish, communication remains a significant challenge, no matter how hard they work. While Portuguese people can understand Spanish with effort, everyday communication can't be done word for word, can it?
As a result, many Portuguese people have learned Spanish and have successfully leveraged this skill to earn higher salaries than Portuguese people who do not speak Spanish.

The conditions for factories in Spain are actually enforced throughout the country. Spain now has a large immigrant population, and some of these immigrants still do not speak Spanish.

Spain also used the same method to encourage these immigrants to learn Spanish, and the results were quite good.

To help these immigrants better master Spanish, language schools built by the Catholic Church would enroll them for free and provide them with a month-long language training program.

While a month is not enough time for these people to fully master Spanish, they can still have brief conversations and understand some commonly used words.

As for mastering Spanish, that can only be achieved through gradual exposure and understanding in subsequent work and life.

While Spanish is relatively easy to assimilate, religion remains a problem for Spain.

Although Spain does not have strict religious requirements, the higher the degree of religious unity, the more stable the country is internally.

The good news is that the Portuguese are also Catholic, which greatly enhances religious unity in Spain.

The fact that the immigrants from Italy were also Catholic is also good news for Spain.

Only immigrants from Germany, France, and Russia did not adhere to Catholicism, but Protestantism and Eastern Orthodoxy are still considered Christianity and are not considered heresy by Catholicism.

The real problem lies with the indigenous people from Morocco and Asia. Once they mastered Spanish, they were eligible to immigrate to mainland Spain.

Although Spain has always accepted a limited number of these immigrants, it has long received a large number of indigenous immigrants.

Unlike the Europeans, who are also Christian, these natives had beliefs that differed significantly from Christianity, making religious assimilation much more difficult.

Today, Spain still has nearly 200 million non-Christians, and for the Spanish Catholic Church, proselytizing to these people is its biggest task.

In order to address the growing number of non-Christians in the country, the Spanish Catholic Church has built language schools in various colonies and sent a large number of missionaries to teach Spanish to the local natives who are willing to immigrate to Spain, while also spreading Catholicism to them.

Only natives who were willing to convert to Catholicism were eligible to immigrate to mainland Spain.

Otherwise, they would have to go to other Spanish colonies and enjoy the same treatment as the Spanish.

The good news is that Spain has completely rejected black immigration, which has also significantly reduced the number of indigenous immigrants.

Otherwise, Spain's few African colonies alone would probably have received hundreds of thousands of black immigrants every year.

Carlo was very wary of this. After localizing Morocco, he strictly prohibited black people from entering the region.

In the future, when localization is carried out in the West African colonies, local authorities will also take relevant measures to deport as many black people as possible out of the West African colonies.

With the widespread adoption of agricultural mechanization in the future, the West African colonies will no longer need so many Black laborers. Hiring only a small number of natives from the Philippine colony will be sufficient to meet their labor needs.

In addition, Spain will also experience a future surplus of manpower, and with its domestic population growing rapidly, it will still need to send a large number of immigrants to Morocco, Portugal, and its West African colonies.

(End of this chapter)