“But we believe in celebrating difference. “We shouldn’t be naive, there are real difficulties,” says Nicolas Matt, in charge at the town hall of the link with religious leaders. Strasbourg’s version, by contrast, is regarded as “normal and natural”, says Murat Ercan, a leader of Turkish origin at the regional Muslim council. Christophe Castaner, the interior minister, who attended another iftar dinner, called such events “an inspiration for the whole of France”.Įlsewhere in the country, a nativity scene built by a far-right mayor constitutes provocative identity politics. To mark Ramadan, the town hall hosted an iftar dinner on its premises-unthinkable elsewhere. Officials and clerics talk often, and know one another. Yet the tie between Strasbourg’s town hall and its religious authorities points to a less abrasive link between the political and the spiritual. He argues that part of the problem is precisely that Islam, unlike other faiths, does not enjoy the same status as the (locally established) religions. “There are many hidden tensions in Strasbourg,” says Hakim El Karoui, author of a report on French Islam for the Institut Montaigne, a think-tank. Officials are particularly concerned about overseas Turkish influence in the town. The region has rooted extreme-right and neo-Nazi fringe groups, and periodically suffers anti-Semitic acts. A local network actively recruited jihadists to head to Syria to fight for Islamic State. On the contrary, the terrorist responsible for the attack in December 2018, Chérif Chekatt, was Strasbourg-born. It does not automatically follow, of course, that Strasbourg is spared religious trouble. The line between the secular and the sacred in France is a constant source of contest and conflict. If it is not over a municipal nativity scene then it is about an attempt to ban a parent from accompanying a class trip while wearing the Muslim veil. For France is periodically consumed by a divisive row of one sort or another about religious expression. The French president even officially appoints the archbishop of Strasbourg.įor those in the rest of France brought up on laïc law, Strasbourg’s relaxed approach to religion, like its town hall’s involvement in Christmas, is startling. The town hall contributed to the financing of the city’s grand mosque. Religious ministers are paid by the state. Four faiths-the Catholic, Lutheran and Reformed churches and Judaism-are established religions in the region. Strasbourg, by contrast, like the surrounding Alsace region, enjoys a derogation under the Napoleonic Concordat of 1801, which survives to this day. It was these principles that led France to ban the Muslim headscarf from state schools, as well as the crucifix and other “conspicuous” religious signs. But it also keeps religion separate from public life. This doctrine protects their private right to religious expression. Today 54% of the French say they are Catholic. This weekend, after a nativity performance outside a church in Toulouse was disrupted, the archbishop deplored the fact that “a simple reminder of the birth of Jesus…is no longer respected in our country.”įrance’s strict form of secularism, known as laïcité, was enshrined in law in 1905 after a long struggle with the Catholic church. When the far-right mayor of Béziers, Robert Ménard, installed a crèche in his town hall, it was ruled illegal and he was ordered to take it down. No French state school is allowed to hold a nativity play or carol service, just as no French town hall can display a nativity scene. Elsewhere in the country, French town halls hang lights that wish their citizens a secular joyeuses fêtes, or happy holidays. Yet if there is one country in which the town’s relaxed approach to religion feels in reality distinctly odd, it is France. Strasbourg’s unapologetic embrace of Christmas, in other words, locates it at the intersection of many of Europe’s traditions. One of the five people murdered in a terrorist attack near the Christmas market a year ago was a local garage mechanic of Afghan origin, who had been visiting the market with his family. A massive 2m visitors, of all faiths, crowd into the town in December every year. Strasbourg in the festive season in reality mixes the commercial and the spiritual, as tacky plastic ornaments and winking Father Christmas figures compete for attention with the crucifix and holy child. These days Christmas time in this town, as elsewhere in Europe, also has a strong secular pull.
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