Visible in the public arena

“Religion in Europe’s public arena” was the topic of the meeting held past May 29 at the European Parliament in Brussels. This the second (held April 17) of the four dialogue seminars on “Islam, Christianity and Europe” promoted within the framework of The Year of Intercultural Dialogue 2008, by the Commission of Bishops Conferences of the European Union (Comece), by the Church and Society Commission of the Conference of European Churches (CEC) and by the Konrad Adenauer Foundation (Kas). Some one-hundred people, including MEPs and EU officers, along with representatives of religious communities and organisations, attended the debate focused on the value and significance of the places of worship and religious symbols. In his introductory address to the conferences, Rüdiger Noll, CEC chairperson, declared that “the European Union ought to be much more than a mere economic space. The European project must belong to and be aimed at citizens” in the continent, “founded on shared values such as human dignity, tolerance and religious freedom”. Returning to the catacombs? “With the increased presence of Muslim citizens in most European Countries – explained the seminar’s organizers on May 29 – the question of religious symbols has triggered a lively debate within societies. More recently, the creation of places of worship for Muslims has become the object of public interest, arousing the resistance and the opposition of citizens in many cities throughout the continent”. The promoters of the gathering claimed: “despite the fact that European Countries have legal systems ensuring religious freedom, which include the freedom of worship, the question of religions’ visibility in Europe’s public arena is ever more controversial”. Referring to the attempts to prevent the exposition of religious symbols in public places, MEP László Surján (Ppe-De, Hungary) guarded against “the risk of returning to the catacombs for Christians and the faithful of other religions in Europe”, similar “to the experience lived by Christians in Eastern Europe during 40 years of Communist dictatorship”. A testing ground. According to Chantal Saint-Blancat, sociology professor at the University of Padua (Italy) “the creation of new places of worship subverts the urban space we are familiar with”. This triggers “discussions and tensions between Muslims on the one side and between residents and local authorities on the other”. However, she pointed out, “in some Countries, especially in Scandinavia, the erection of a Mosque entails consultations with all parties at stake”. These tensions, Ms. Blancat remarked, “might give rise to new opportunities such as the mutual recognition between communities; an occasion, for Muslims, to understand Europe’s secularized context along with the possibility for our multicultural societies to transform urban spaces in ‘a testing ground’ on pluralism”. Transcendence and the common good. Reverend Berit Schelde Christensen, from Denmark’s Lutheran Evangelical Church, pointed out that “religions contribute to social cohesion”. From this viewpoint, “the creation of places of worship is important in that it responds to the quest for meaning of our fellow citizens”. “We must acknowledge the quest for spirituality pertaining to each human being”, she underlined, expressing also her regret for the fact that “because of society’s strong secularization, our contemporaries no longer understand religious language”. This is the reason for the appeal launched to Europe’s Christians “to reflect on the way in which they can employ the principle of transcendence in order to contribute to the common good”. A culture of religious pluralism. In his rejection of “religious extremism” and also of “secularist extremisms”, imam Yahya Sergio Pallavicini, vice-president of Italy’s Muslim religious community, voiced the promotion “of a culture of religious pluralism”. “Most of the great mosques erected in European capital cities have been financed by Saudi Arabia”, the Imam remarked. He expressed his hope that “these may continue being places of worship, and not places for political propaganda”.Planning together. At the end of the meeting, M. Joël Privot, architect and co-founder of “Expert-is”, the Muslim religious infrastructures counselling agency, illustrated his approach to these kinds of buildings, which consists in “bringing together inhabitants, local authorities and members of the religious community to design and integrate mosques within the European context”. Integration, he concluded, “also entails the construction of architectonic and environmental high-quality mosques”. The next seminar will be held July 3rd, in the seat of European Parliament in Brussels on “Christian Europe and Islam in Europe”.