An injustice and an error” “

“The marginalization of the religions that have contributed and still contribute to the culture and humanism of which Europe is legitimately proud, seems to me both an injustice and an error”, observed the Pope in his address to the diplomatic corps accredited to the Holy See on 10 January. The Holy Father’s words aroused numerous reactions: “No one is excluded from the process of promoting European integration”, declared the President of the European Commission, Romano Prodi. In the view of the ambassador Sergio Romano, in an article in Corriere della Sera (11 January), constitutions, including that of Europe, “ought not to be philosophic documents” but be limited to defining structures, tasks and rules of the institutions. We asked Msgr. Attilio Nicora , delegate of the Presidency of the Italian Episcopal Conference (CEI) for juridical questions and vice-president of the Commission of the episcopates of the European Community (COMECE), for his comment. Various doubts have been expressed about whether the work of the Convention decided at the recent European summit at Laeken may produce a Constitution of the “Italian” or “German” kind, because it is well known that the British positions and those of the Scandinavian world are little in favour of these models. A more probable solution would seem to be a “re-manipulation” of the complex of EU treaties, highlighting some aspects considered primary and in some way fundamental, so that a kind of hierarchy of values in the elements that identify the Union may emerge. If this second perspective is preferred, the problem is downplayed, but it does not seem to me that the theme of values ought to remain merely in the background and that the document that eventually emerges from the Convention should be limited to defining aspects of organizational or functional type. Such a view would seem to me frankly too reductive, not least because it would be difficult for such a document to inspire the minimum of enthusiasm and solidarity among European citizens that is being so widely invoked. In this context our main concerns can be summed up in three points. The first aspect should be the clear recognition of the right of religious freedom. This is already enshrined in the Charter of Fundamental Rights, but it does not yet have any direct juridical sanction. It would be appropriate, on the contrary, if the right to religious freedom were to be protected under more properly “Community” law. In the second place, the right to religious freedom ought to be safeguarded not only as a right that embraces its personal and collective expressions, understood as the sum of individuals, but also as the right enjoyed by religious confessions: a right translated into full organizational autonomy and into wide scope of expression in the field of social life, each according to its own identity: in other words, the confessions also need to be recognized as subjects of religious freedom. The third aspect concerns the relations which the religious confessions may establish with States and with the Union. As far as relations with States are concerned, I consider that declaration no. 11 annexed to the final Act of the Treaty of Amsterdam ought to become part of the Union’s body of law, reconfirming that the definition of any relations between the confessions and the States is the competence of the States themselves. As for any relations of the confessions with the Union, I believe that the solution to be hoped for is that of the identification of places and methods of confrontation and dialogue, which ought not to remain entrusted to a dimension of “benevolence” of the Union’s institutions towards the Churches, but ought to find a minimum of formal regulation. This need for places and forms of dialogue already holds good for the work of the Convention. But one great concern of ours is this: it would be difficult for us to accept being readmitted to the economic and social Committee as a mere expression of civil society, for two main reasons. First, because this Committee has its own rather precise connotation and, second, because the religious confessions are not in the first place bearers of interests, however legitimate, but the expression of experiences and contributions characterized by the dimension of transcendence: they present an undeniable originality of their own.