Edited by Géraldine Mossière

University of Montreal Press, 2021

https://www.pum.umontreal.ca/catalogue/dits_et_non_dits

Did the baby boomers throw religion out with the holy water? Are they truly atheists? How do they give meaning to the major events of the life cycle? What lies behind the invisibility or even the taboo of the religious in Quebec after the decline of Catholicism? In short: what remains of the legacy of Catholicism among the baby-boom generation?

Based on life stories collected from around a hundred Quebecers born Catholic in the 1950s, the authors explore the search for meaning in individual and collective experiences. Despite the invisibility of the religious in the public sphere, most of the people interviewed display beliefs and practices that are their own. While these borrow from various religious registers inspired by cultural diversity, Catholic memory and education remain present in the accounts as well as in practices, sometimes tinged with the vocabulary of spirituality. This book paints a portrait of Quebec modernity and the secularization of society, notably showing the identity debates that animate the collective imagination and shape individual consciences. Above all, it fills a gap in the literature on religious behaviors in Quebec.

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Géraldine Mossièreis an anthropologist, a professor at the Institute of Religious Studies at the University of Montreal, and holder of the EHESS-IMéRA Chair in Transregional Studies (2019–2020). She has published with the University of Montreal Press Converted to Islam: Women's Journeys in Quebec and France (2013).