A church-backed report has documented rising anti-Christian prejudice in Europe, despite calls for fairer legislation and measures to curb discrimination.
“Studies suggest 85 percent of hate crimes in Europe are directed against Christians — it is high time for the public debate to respond to this reality,” said Gudrun Kugler, director of the Vienna-based Observatory on Intolerance and Discrimination against Christians. “A restrictive application of freedom of conscience is leading to professions such as magistrates, doctors, nurses and midwives as well as pharmacists slowly closing for Christians. Teachers and parents get into trouble when they disagree with state-defined sexual ethics,” Kugler said March 19.
Her agency’s 53-page report, published the same day, said incidents in 2011 had included a resolution by European legislators calling for a reassessment of legislation with “negative ramifications for Christians,” and a ruling by the European Court of Human Rights that Christian crosses could remain in Italian schools after a constitutional challenge. It said “countless individuals and institutions” had warned of increasing anti-Christian intolerance and that the observatory had documented acts of vandalism, desecration, defamation and the exclusion of Christians from public and social life. “Intolerant and discriminatory behavior results from opposition to individual traits of the Christian faith or moral positions that are intrinsically part of the Christian faith, as well as from a negative, categorical bias against Christians or Christianity as a whole,” the report said. “This behavior causes various sectors of society to be used as vehicles of intolerance and discrimination against Christians.” Church leaders have urged better protection for Christian rights after complaints of prejudice across Europe.
OXFORD, England (CNS)