Abstract
Purpose – This study focuses on the role of church in relation to state in providing support for needy. Design/methodology/approach – The analysis takes place in a Nordic welfare state context between two recession in the early 1990s and late 2000s. The welfare state regime hypothesis suggests that the kind of traditional assistance the church lends to the poor would die out in the course of “socio-democratic” welfare state development, a statement analogous with the secularization hypothesis. Findings – With data on the volume of poverty alleviation activities of the Finnish Evangelical Lutheran Church it is shown that after decades of marginalization the role of the church’s poverty alleviation became more pronounced after the recession in the early 1990’s and continued to do so throughout the economic collapse of 2008. Research limitations/implications – The results give ground to challenge the conventional clear cut conception of the universal Nordic wel-fare state model.Originality/value – European welfare state research has focused on the links between religious values, religious cleavages and the shaping of the welfare state but has mostly ignored the role of faith-based institutions in prov-ing welfare. The current economic crisis may provide religious institutions window of opportunity to expand their poverty alleviation activities.