A century after” “

A “non-fundamentalist” interpretation of the French law of 1905 on the separation between Church and State, the first centenary of which is being celebrated this year, is what is called for by René Rémond in the last number of Etudes , the monthly of contemporary culture founded by the Jesuits in 1856. Tracing the history of the review, profoundly affected by the laws against the religious congregations that forced its closure from 1881 to 1888, its senior editor Henri Madelin affirms in his editorial that “each form of secularism means pluralism and respect for differences” and, with regard to the recent law that prohibits the “ostentatious display of religious symbols” in public places, poses the question, with particular reference to the question of the wearing of the Islamic headscarf in schools: “In such complex fields, in which religious identity and social malaise” are often “interlinked, how can anyone believe that a law can act as if by magic?”. It would be preferable, in Madelin’s view, “to formulate a kind of code of good conduct from which the internal regulations of schools, universities, administrations and companies could derive inspiration”. More generally, “the political power cannot treat the religions present in our country as if they were all similar to each other”. the three pillars of secularism. President of the national Foundation of Political Sciences and member of the Académie Française, René Rémond, in his article in Etudes which develops a reflection he presented on the occasion of the last Assembly of French bishops (Lourdes 4-10 November 2003), urges that the “original interpretation” of the aforesaid law of 1905 be not rigidly adhered to. Rather, he suggests, the evolution that the concept of the lay state has undergone over the years should be taken into account. National unity that “does not tolerate any form of particularism perceived as a threat for social cohesion”; role of the State “strictly confined to the public sphere”; absence of recognition of civil society: these, in Rémond’s view, are the “three pillars of the philosophic system within which the concept of the lay state took root in the early years of the twentieth century”. A century later. Today, observes Rémond, “we no longer have this ‘unilateral’ conception of unity” and “diversity, no longer suspected of dissidence, is considered a factor of enrichment”. As for the role of the State, “it is no longer considered an anomaly that it intervenes in numerous sectors that do not correspond to functions considered ‘under the control of the state’ in the strict sense, with a view to remedying failings of private initiative. The public budget no longer has the single task of ensuring the functioning of the public services: it operates a redistribution of resources and supports every activity judged useful for the community at large”. Hence the State’s assumption “of part of the costs of Catholic education”. In the light of this development, according to Rémond “the old maxim ‘public funds to public schools; private funds to private schools’ seems obsolete. Its application would be discriminatory”. As far as the third “pillar” is concerned, “civil society has progressively obtained de facto and de jure recognition” and the dialogue established between “all the components of the latter and the State is the consequence of the same historic evolution”. In this field, says Rémond, “the introduction of regular meetings between the government and the presidency of the Episcopal Conference does not contravene the spirit of the lay state, but seems in harmony with the modern interpretation of the three pillars on which it is founded”. Church and lay State. “This evolution of the concept of the lay State has been possible – continues Rémond – because, concurrently, the Church’s judgement on the matter has much changed”: from the “categorical condemnation by the Assembly of cardinals and archbishops of the so-called law on secularism of 1925” to the “text of the same Assembly which, in 1945, distinguished between ideology – secularism – and the regime of the lay state”, followed, twenty years later, by “the declaration of the Conciliar Fathers on religious liberty” which “opens the way to the acceptance of a pluralist society in the framework of a secularism that does not ignore – still less combat – religion”. Today, warns Rémond, “there is a risk” that phenomena such as “the new religious convictions, the irruption of Islam, the enlargement of the debate on secularism at the European level”, may arouse” a return to the original conception of the lay state and lead to French society losing the benefit of the positive evolution that has taken place on the matter. It is not by the regression to an archaic State – he concludes – but by original, generous and intelligent solutions that a response may be found to the new challenges we face”.