By Christian Eyschen <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

As discussions continue over the draft European Constitution, Christian Eyschen, General Secretary of the French Libre Pensée, urges freethinkers to fight for a secular Europe. What follows is the adapted and edited transcript of a radio talk given on France-Culture.

Will Europe be secular, republican, social and democratic one day? We are often asked this question. If by Europe we mean a continent, then the answer is undoubtedly YES. Europe will be what the free people, the nations and the states of Europe make of it, if one follows the great tradition of the right of peoples to decide the future of their nations. On the other hand, if Europe means the supranational institutions of Brussels and Strasbourg, then the answer is NO. That Europe is clerical, reactionary, anti-social and the opposite of democratic.

In the current European Union, there are as many republics as monarchies. Which system will Brussels choose? The difference is not a small one.

What is the difference?

Fourteen out of the fifteen countries of the EU, with the formal exception of France, recognize either state religions (in northern Europe, of the Protestant tradition), established state churches (as in England and France), or, in the case of countries with a Roman Catholic tradition, concordats with the Vatican. Even Portugal, supposedly secular since the ‘Carnation Revolution’ of 1974, has retained the concordat of Salazar concluded in 1929.

A concordat is a diplomatic agreement between a state and the Vatican, and is used to support Roman Catholicism in the state. In most cases, priests and other church officials are paid with public funds, and the money of citizens supports Catholic schools, whatever their own private beliefs. There are concordats in France in Alsace and Moselle, and in Germany, Austria, Italy, Spain, and Portugal. And the Vatican hastens to conclude agreements with countries waiting to join the EU, such as Poland and Slovakia. Concordats are spreading across Europe like a disease.

In all EU countries except France, Roman Catholic, Orthodox or Anglican priests, Jewish rabbis, Protestant ministers, and Muslim imams can be teachers in state schools. In most of these countries, religions are taught in state schools.

The medieval offence of blasphemy is still recognized in many European countries, notably in Germany, Austria, Greece, Denmark, England, and Spain. It is forbidden to criticize religions under threat of prosecution.

The Role of the European Treaties

The Treaty of Maastricht (1992) brought Education and Culture into the fields of competence of the EU. A teacher in a state school of any EU country will be able to teach in any other EU country, subject to the validation of his or her competency through the appropriate certificates. What would happen if an Italian Roman Catholic priest who is a teacher applies for a teaching post in France? His application would be turned down because the secular school laws and the 1905 law of separation of church and state forbid priests from teaching in French state schools. But he will then call on the European Court of Justice on the basis of discrimination and failure of application of the European principle of reciprocity. And European Community legislation takes precedence over national laws.

The European treaties serve to create a dynamic to share whatever is widespread in Europe. In this case, the widespread trend is not secularism but clericalism.

One also wonders about the protection of fundamental democratic liberties. The French 1905 law of separation of church and state ensures the freedom of conscience in its first article and enables this to be achieved through Article 2: ‘the Republic does not recognize, does not pay nor subsidize any creed’. Yet the European Court of Justice does not regard established religions, blasphemy, or church taxes as contrary to Article 9 of the European Convention of Human Rights.

Amsterdam 1997

In June 1997, the Intergovernmental Conference of Amsterdam was to revise the Treaty of Maastricht. A few months earlier, the Vatican had proposed that the chapter of the Treaty covering fundamental freedoms should include a reference to Christianity as the common cultural heritage of the people of Europe. But the Vatican is not a Member State of the EU, and the proposal was not discussed. Nevertheless, shortly before the opening of the Amsterdam conference, Italy, Germany, Austria, and Portugal made the same request. As a result, the EU adopted Declaration No. 11, which stipulates that the status of religious bodies under the national law of Member States would be respected (see box). The anti-democratic privileges of the churches were thereby guaranteed.

Article 51 of the Draft European Constitution

Clerical lobbies demand that Declaration No. 11 of Amsterdam be adopted as Article 51 in the future European Constitution, with an additional clause on dialogue with churches and other organizations (see box). While it now seems very unlikely that a reference to God and Christianity as a cultural heritage of the people of Europe will appear in the Constitution, that will not in itself make the EU a secular institution, for two reasons. First, the inclusion of Article 51 would maintain religious privilege in the Member States. A second reason results from the principle of subsidiarity.

The principle of subsidiarity is the engine of the European institutions. It first appeared in the 1931 encyclical Quadragesimo Anno by Pius XI, in which it was defined thus: ‘The supreme authority of the State ought, therefore, to let subordinate groups handle matters and concerns of lesser importance, which would otherwise dissipate its efforts greatly. Thereby the State will more freely, powerfully, and effectively do all those things that belong to it alone because it alone can do them: directing, watching, urging, restraining, as occasion requires and necessity demands.’

The model for social and economic organization praised by the pope was Italian Fascism and the vertical corporatist trade unions. This idea of subsidiarity was incorporated in the construction of the European Union as the formula ‘never entrust to an organization of higher rank what can be done by an organization of lower rank’. That seems plain common sense. But if you look more closely, it becomes apparent that it is a reactionary principle.

In which society was this principle fully applied? In the Ancien Régime of France. The organization of higher rank, the monarchy, only dealt with the kingly capacities: the police forces, the army, justice, and diplomacy. In brief, war and repression. All the rest, which is the prerogative of a modern society, was entrusted to organizations of lower rank. Education, social care, and hospitals were entrusted to the Catholic Church. Taxes were collected by the Fermiers Généraux, who cheerfully helped themselves on the way. It was a social disaster.

When the revolutionists of 1789 wanted to achieve democracy and equality, they proclaimed the Republic and they invented the public services. They did the opposite of the Ancien Régime, entrusting the missions of general interest to organizations of higher rank: public services and republican, national, departmental, and municipal administration. That is what permits real equality.

By contrast, the subsidiarity applied by the European Union results in the privatization of public services. Subsidiarity spells the destruction of republican and social achievements. It is the end of the Republic, but not the end of the State, which sees its kingly capacities reinforced – ‘directing, watching, urging, restraining’, as Pius XI said.

The future European Constitution looks set, then, to be clerical. We should refuse this old world that smells of holy water and the safe. We should refuse a clerical Europe dominated by the Vatican. That is why the national Federation of the French Libre Pensée and the British National Secular Society, have launched a joint declaration to call for a European secular gathering in Paris on Saturday, 6 December, 2003. Let us fight for a secular Europe!