Christians have the right to practise their religion but do not enjoy religious freedom
Tehran (AsiaNews) A delegation from the 'Islam Committee' of the Catholic Bishops' Conference of Switzerland, which has just returned from a week-long visit to Iran, said that Freedom to practise one's religion is protected in Iran, but people do not enjoy total religious freedom. The delegation was in the Islamic country from April 17 to 24 talking to Iranian Muslims and Christians about the rights of religions minorities and the problems they face.
The ten-member group led by Mgr Pierre Bürcher, assistant bishop of Lausanne, included priests, religieux and lay people. It was also joined by representatives of the local church in what was described as a fruitful and constructive work.
Mario Galgano, spokesman for the Swiss Bishops Conference, summed up the visit's good results saying: "On one side they [Iranian Christians] are happy to live in a country where they can practise their faith. They can organise mass, they can pray and they can have churches. [. . .] But the problem is they cannot do more than this. They cannot speak about their faith outside their community." In short, they are free to practise their religion but only within their own communities.
Although in a briefing yesterday to the international press, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said, among other things, that Iran was one of the few countries "where religious minorities have equal rights", the reality is that Islam is the state's official religion and only a small number of religions (Christians, Jews, Zoroastrians) are authorised, their members exercising limited rights. All other religions are illegal.
Ahmadinejad's claims aside, the Swiss delegation stressed in its final press release that religious freedom cannot be limited to the right to practise for it includes "freedom to have or to adopt a religion or belief of his choice, and freedom, either individually or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in worship, observance, practice and teaching" (Article 18-1 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights). The application of these rules, which are part of Iran's international obligations, is the real problem, and shall be the bases of dialogue in the future.
On a personal level, Bishop Bürcher spoke about women and men nourished by their faith, equal in their relationship to God. For this reason, many often call for reciprocity in the Islamic-Christian dialogue. However, there are major differences in legal and social terms when it comes to minority groups. For instance, there is no real symmetry between the situation of religious minorities that have lived in Iran for centuries and that of recently Muslim immigrants in Europe (for example, Muslims constitute 4.3 per cent of the Swiss population).
The delegation addressed other issues as well such as conversion and apostasy, the relations between state and religions, human rights (like women's rights and freedom of expression), which were discussed at a symposium and in meetings with former Iranian President Mohammad Khatami and ayatollah Araqi, head of the Islamic Culture and Relations Organization, who visited Switzerland in September 2005 as part of an Iranian delegation.
The delegation also visited shrines and libraries in Qom and Isfahan, met representatives of other religious minorities (Christians of various rites and confessions, Jews and Zoroastrians) and took part in prayers and celebrations with Latin and Assyrian-Chaldean Catholics.
The Iranian hosts' traditional hospitality contributed to the success of the visit. A book containing accounts of the meetings in Iran will be published in Farsi and English.
Officially, there are 79,000 Christians in the country according to the Iranian government. However, Armenians alone should be around 200,000. Other Christian groups should together be around 20,000-50,000.
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24/01/2014
21/07/2006
