Dutch Tolerance

To the world at large, it may seem as if anything goes in Holland. I mean, this is the country that has long celebrated the legalization of marijuana and prostitution.

But the Dutch themselves are perplexed at this view, and certainly don't see themselves as open to anyone and everything. For, yes, while Holland is indeed an extremely tolerant culture (The Netherlands was the first country in the world to bring into law same-sex marriage and adoption rights for same-sex couples), it is a specific type of progressive attitude that embraces diversity so long as these diverse threads do not disrupt regular life and society.

In a way, it's a kind of "keep it to yourself" approach, which allows individuals and groups to do whatever they like, so long as they just "behave normal." In other words, no major emotional outbursts, bragging or pretension (especially around money), or acting out in a disobedient, weird, or foreign manner.

The attitude stems from an historic way in which the Dutch organized their society into pillars according to different religions or ideologies, and it has allowed people of all different customs, races, and cultures to live together very peacefully for centuries.

It's a unique and strange mix of tolerance and intolerance. It's also pragmatic, another famous quality of Dutch national character, for it allowed the people of Holland to become world leaders in trade, which of course requires conducting business among all kinds of people.

Today, I visited Our Lady in the Attic, a 17th-century, secret canalhouse church, which is now a museum. The story behind this church exemplifies Dutch understandings of toleration and is an underpinning to modern attitudes.

Throughout the late 16th-cenutry, the Dutch threw off Spanish, Catholic rule and forced the Spanish out of the country. Amsterdam was the last city to revolt, and in bloodless revolution, which took place in one day, the Catholic city council was peacefully ejected and all of the churches were converted into Protestant (Calvinist) churches by stripping them of their iconography and whitewashing the interiors. This event is known as The Alteration, and included the grand cathedrals of Nieuwe Kerk and Oude Kerk.

The new Protestant government allowed the Catholics to continue to worship, so long as their places of worship were not visible to the outside. This was also applicable for Jewish residents of Amsterdam as well as other Protestant sects like the Baptists. Indeed, you can see the beginnings of the special kind of tolerance exhibited in modern Holland.

Twenty-nine secret house-churches emerged in the 17th-century where Catholics worshiped in secret. Our Lady in the Attic is the only one still in existence, and it is magnificently preserved.

The house was purchased by a German, Catholic merchant in the early 1600's, and he somehow renovated the attic spaces of three separate houses, pushing up the ceilings using the building techniques of the time.

Imagine worhippers piling in from the alley below and climbing up to this secret church, which can't be seen from the outside. I mean look at all the pews!

The altar, up close:

The merchant lived in the house with his wife and eight children. And the priest, whose box bed is pictured here:

Gorgeous 17th-century wood floors below, and a marble floor above, in typical Dutch classical style (i.e. symmetrical):

From one window in the attic, you can see the future. For, in the distance is the basilica of Saint Nicholas, which was built in the 19th Century when all religions were allowed to worship openly.

The church from above:

From another window in the attic, one can perceive the past with a view of Oude Kerk, which was stripped of its Catholic identity during The Alteration.

DS and I recently visited Oude Kerk, where you can still see small remnants of colorful Catholic painting dating back to the 14th-cenutry, and appreciate what happened to a church during an "alteration."

In a new part of the adjacent building, the museum created a room for visitors to think about the meaning of tolerance, particularly in context of today's current events.

Russell Shorto, a popular, well-respected American author, has written extensively about Amsterdam and New Amsterdam (i.e. New York). Somewhere, I recall reading his suggestion that Dutch tolerance is a valuable perspective in the today's world, that perhaps now is not the time to celebrate diversity, per se, but to simply tolerate difference. Food for thought.