The Vatican said it experienced “surprise and sorrow” when a European court ruled that the crucifixes hanging in Italian public schools violate religious freedom.
The European Court of Human Rights ruled Nov. 3 that the crucifixes hanging in every public classroom in Italy were “a violation of the freedom of parents to educate their children according to their own convictions and of the religious freedom of the students.”
Father Federico Lombardi, Vatican spokesman, reacted to the decision saying, “The crucifix has always been a sign of God’s offer of love and a sign of union and welcome for all humanity. It is sad that it is being considered a sign of division, exclusion or limitation of freedom. That is not what it is and that is not the common feeling of our people.”
Sorry — gotta disagree with the Vatican on this one. The argument being put forth in favor of crucifixes in the classroom was that they weren’t actually a RELIGIOUS symbol at all — rather a historical, cultural blah blah symbol. Keep up that line of reasoning and that’s exactly what they will become. The Catholic Church in Europe seems to continually pursue the line that “if you’re not interested in Christianity as a religion, how about keeping it around as a cultural heritage?” That way leads to the museum.
So is Italy even bound by this? Or did they cede their sovereignty?
#2 Italy is a sovereign nation and is also a constituent member of the European Union. It is bound by this ruling.
So they have ceded their sovereignty to the EU (for all practical purposes, even if on paper they haven’t completely).
A simple Google search, or the EU’s Wikipedia article, would clear up your misconception. The EU is comprised of 27 sovereign nations that have chosen to allow some decisions to be made through negotiation between members states, and other decisions made by delegated supranational institutions.
“supranational institutions.” Such as the Catholic Church?
After lengthy personal examination of these types of actions by secular authorities, I have come to the conclusion that crosses, crescent moons, statues of Buddha or sacred cows, do not belong in the classroom. A person’s decision on faith is their own. They will be influenced by family and friends and it is not up to the school teacher. I personally would not trust teachers today to influence my child in this regard.
5, so they have ceded their sovereignty. Fools.
FWIW it may be better to say that they have delegated some sovereign powers under treaty. It’s not quite ceding authority since sovereign nations may withdraw from treaties at any point (though it may be disadvantageous to do so). Whether such delegation of sovereign power is prudent or not I’ll leave to others who wiser than me.
Nevertheless the EU is slowly garnering some state-like powers…
All the EU countries accept that they must be bound by certain supranational decisions on questions of human rights. I am, frankly, amazed that commenters here should still be unaware of that.
It would mark a huge leap forward for the world if the American public could also start to believe more in supranational solutions and less in narrow gut-nationalism!
1. Catholic Mom
10. Fr. Mark.
You may or may not be interested in the Catholic perspective on this, but here it is: Even nation states are considered by the Church to be artificial entities which may exist in one epoch and not in another. There will always be some kind of government whether it is a city state, a fiefdom, a nation state or an empire. All are artificial and transient in the course of centuries. Nevertheless, man is bound by a natural moral law that knows no boundaries. Religious express of a people is part of the social order which should not be superseded by government on any level, but rather protected. In other words, governments which are always transitory in nature are the temporary custodians of the social cultures which pre-existed them and which will likely survive them. Religion is part of that social culture.
While the Catholic Church sees Christianity and Judaism as a supernatural, religion in general is of the social order and thus should be protected regardless of its creed. For example it upholds that Buddhist religious culture is part of the social order in those countries which are historically Buddhist and that the governments of those countries have a duty to protect that religious culture.
This is a natural law argument, which is never fully satisfying to the Christian ear. However, this form of argumentation allows the Church to express her moral and ethical teachings in a way that non-believers cannot dismiss out of hand. It is not the Church sees herself as a mere cultural artifact, but it understands that many will appreciate her only from that perspective.
Natural law argumentation is a skill that all Christians are going to have to learn if they want to have a voice in the secular town square.
I dont think that there is a Christian preference between nation state government and supranational government. I think each system is neutral and its relative good depends on the content of its ideology. The Soviet system was supranational. The US before the Constitution was a supranational organization of states. I don’t think it really matters. Even democracy is not necessarily a more moral system. Entire peoples can be morally corrupt and thoroughly committed to evil.