editorial" "
In the crucial debate on the war in Iraq a European interlocutor is lacking. And its lack is deeply felt. The question is still open and closely linked with the process of the Convention on the future of Europe, which is now reaching its most important stage, just at a time when events are taking place that are crucial for redesigning the framework of international relations in the new century. Any text, and especially any text of a constitution, is a child of its time. It endures in proportion as it succeeds in expressing its time, projecting it into the future, and anchoring it to firm principles, to a precise constituent subject, to a civilization capable of a longer breath, a longer vision. The Convention’s end is clearly not the text of a Constitution; so the first text proposed is a good starting point for designing the framework of the “policies of member states”, as stated by article 1 of the draft. But the ambition and probably the hopes are greater than that: what is at issue is defining, if not a Constitution, at least a constitutional horizon. Here, at this complex crossroads, in this contradiction that is typical of the process of European construction and of its originality, ever torn between ideal impulses and real interests, is placed the issue of the recognition of the identity and role of the Churches and of the Christian heritage of Europe. If we are to arrive at a Constitution, we cannot avoid the question of the constituent subject, of its heritage of values, of its identity and projection towards the future. Whether one reasons in constituent terms, or in the more modest but necessary terms of the re-formulation of treaties, one cannot avoid the question of the pluralist articulation of European society, nor the recognition of the subjectivity of the religious institutions and the affirmation of religious freedom. We therefore need to intervene to fill the evident gaps that the first provisional articles of the treaty clearly present, and we need to do so with serenity and farsightedness. There are three points, distinct but interconnected, that need to be addressed. The first is the affirmation of the Christian identity of Europe and hence of the Union itself as an institutional and constitutional subject. At the roots of this request, repeatedly underlined by the Pope, there is no confessional claim. It’s aim is not to place in question the secular character of the political institutions, which is one of the achievements of Western democracy. From the Catholic point of view, as John Paul II has often remarked, it’s a way of “giving to values the profound rooting of transcendental type that is expressed in the opening to the religious dimension”. Of course it may be far easier to assert this principle than to translate it into constitutional expression, but, not only in terms of memory or identity, but also in terms of future development, it is one of the essential steps to delineate the future of democracy, and redeem it from the materialism that, in various forms, is always reassumed in the law of the strongest. In this perspective are also placed the other two connected issues of the affirmation of religious liberty and the safeguard of the specific identity and social role of the Churches and of the religious confessions. Of course, nothing seems at present to hinder the recognition of religious liberty in the member countries of the Union, but the fact remains that religious liberty is the most solid foundation and the best guarantee of all the other liberties and hence of the democratic edifice itself. Moreover, the principle of subsidiarity, although rightly reaffirmed in the first draft produced by the Convention, cannot be simply applied to the local, state and European Community subjects of public policies. It also requires that the lively social and institutional pluralism typical of European society be recognized and enhanced. The Churches are justifiably an expression of this pluralism. That’s why their role too must be suitably recognized and enhanced. They cannot be reduced to mere private entities, without severely penalizing the very structure of European democracy, its originality, and consequently its responsibility to a world that more than ever awaits a new centre point.
