The Holy Orthodox Church of Greece will convene its Holy Synod next week to address the fallout and consequences of the recent EU Court of Human Rights' decision to remove any crucifixes from all Italian schoolrooms for fear that the display of such a prominent symbol of Christianity violates the freedom of religion of students who do not subscribe to Catholic Christainity or Christainity in any form.
Already, in Greece, a group calling itself the Helsinki Monitor is already using the Strasbourg decision as precedent and pushing the Greek government to remove icons of Christ the judge which hang in courtrooms and prevent witnesses from swearing on the Gospels to tell the truth as well as remove other religious symbols from Greek schools.
I'm hopeful that Greece will not bend to pressure from the European Union and that the Church there will stand up for what is true freedom of religion. But, then again, I don't expect the Europeans to have anything close to what we have here in the states (at least now) regarding freedom of religion. I really like this quote from Archbishop IERONYMOUS:
It is not only minorities that have rights but majorities as well.
May the Church be successful in her efforts to defend the Truth.
It is not 'true religious freedom' for the government to promote one religion and not another. Would it be ok if a teacher put up Islamic material in the classroom and there were children from Christian parents in the room? Imagine the uproar.
ReplyDeleteA few things:
Delete1) This post was made nearly 3 years ago and you're just now posting on it? Were you trolling around sites to find a thought that you disagreed so you can post a rebuttal? And, by the way, I prefer people use their names when they post. You get one freebie.
2) Promotion of one religion does not mean another is persecuted or proscribed or forbidden or coercive. Such an argument is typical of paranoid atheists. Greece is a Greek Orthodox country and, unless, I'm mistaken, that link is written into their own constitution. I'll have to check to be sure. Needless to say, there is no separation of church and state like there is here in the US.
3) Drawing on my previous point, Greece has been Orthodox for 1700+ years. The display of icons also reflects a historical reality which should not be purged because someone may not like the history.
4) As I wrote above, "But, then again, I don't expect the Europeans to have anything close to what we have here in the states regarding freedom of religion." They don't have a separation of church and state as we do here, but at the same time, I applauded the Greeks for not forsaking their history and heritage because of a bunch of out-of-control intolerant secularists. Yes, true freedom of religion does mean all religions can be practiced. But Islam does not have the heritage in Greece as does Orthodoxy and there are not many Muslims. Besides, Muslims don't have an iconographic inheritance anyway, so I don't think we'll be seeing any Muslim material up in the schools beyond what is covered in the textbooks.