crucifixes in classrooms is
guarantee of freedom for all,
Pier Giacomo Grampa, Bishop of Lugano. (SOURCE: www.gdp.ch )
A recent ruling by the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg decreed the removal of crucifixes from the classrooms of nearby Italy. "Summum jus, summa iniuria" said the ancients. When you apply the right coldly abstract and ideological bias will produce short-sighted and wrong judgments, because the principle of secularism does not respect the religious sentiments of hostility. Secularism does not mean agnosticism, estrangement, hostility with respect to religion (that would be a range of ideological field, in spite of the neutrality of the state) can not claim to endorse the deletion of a traditionally accepted value in a particular people. When the cross is placed outside of a place of worship has a value not religious, but cultural symbol of tradition and values, which of course does not exclude the existence of other values, expressed in a symbolic rather the source of values \u200b\u200bof tolerance, respect, respect for persons, autonomy of consciousness against moral authority. The position of the Swiss Bishops about our initiative against the construction of minarets in Switzerland is the proof of this attitude of common sense, tolerance and respect. I wonder if instead of the dry, abstract right we should not use a little more common sense to solve some problems of coexistence and integration. For example, companies working in today's question should not be abolished, in behalf of right to equality, the festivities on Sunday with a clear Christian matrix, rather than to ensure that all of life is not in conflict with their religious profession. The Christians have not abolished the pagan names of the days of the week: day of the moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, when they introduced on Saturday and Sunday of Jewish Christian origin. It is a matter of degree, mutual tolerance, balance and common sense lest a pointless religious wars. To return to the crucified recall what I wrote in the Unity of 22 March 1998, a writer does not suspect of weaknesses clerical, Natalia Ginzburg, "The cross is the sign of human suffering. The crown of thorns, the nails, evoke his suffering. We think the cross high atop the mountain, is a sign of loneliness in death. I know of no other signs that give so strongly the sense of our human destiny. The crucifix is \u200b\u200bpart of world history. For Catholics, Jesus Christ is the Son of God for non-Catholics may be simply an image that has been sold, betrayed, tortured and died on the cross for love of God and neighbor. "
