Welcome back to our
discussion of secularism
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with guest Dr. John Graz.
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We could tackle this
from many points of view,
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but one thing that
comes to mind quickly is--
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about a year ago, a
bit over a year ago,
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you had a meeting of
experts in Australia.
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Yeah. And I was privileged--
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At the University of Sydney,
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you can imagine,
we were invited--
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The seat of
secular learning, Sydney.
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Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I
was privileged to be there,
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and it was interesting for
me, because I'm an Australian.
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And I've-- but
I've been away from
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that country for many years.
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And as I look at my homeland,
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and even as
religion is practice there,
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I see that it is
pervasively secular, secular.
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Even in a religious
context, it's approached
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from a sort of a
secular viewpoint.
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In some ways,
religion is not all
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encompassing even
for a religionist.
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They've divided it
into-- we go to church,
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you do this, but
their mindset is secular,
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which I don't think is good.
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But certainly, in
Australia secularism
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has enabled religious freedom.
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It's not opposed to it, is it?
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Yeah, right. In the
first step I should say,
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it's just win of
freedom in many ways,
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you know, I think
that secular as I said,
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secularism or the secular
thought was very well accepted
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by religious freedom, by
religious freedom leaders,
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by all those who
have been persecuted,
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because they were a minority.
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It means, you know,
as religious minority,
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we don't want a religious
state, because we know that,
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by history and by human nature,
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that a religious state
will transform, you know,
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the life of million of
people and will force them
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maybe to go to church.
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Maybe on the social
point we will say yes, good,
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they are forced to go to church.
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But look, the result are good.
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Well, they're forced to a
narrow religious viewpoint
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that doesn't include variants
on that particular faith
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or certainly wouldn't allow
other religious expression.
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And you know when you associate
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politics and
religion, what happen?
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You know, the politician
are very pragmatic people.
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They want to
build a strong state.
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They will not pass, you know,
alliance with a small church.
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No. They will negotiate or
negotiate with a strong church.
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It mean the majority.
What about the minorities?
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And when--as you are,
we are all human beings.
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If you give
privilege to religious leaders,
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maybe some will
do, will do well with.
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But some other will
use the privilege as it was
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in the past to liquidate
their enemies or opponents.
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That's a human being, you know.
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You know, I've not
deeply read in communist theory,
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but you know,
Karl Marx did pick up
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on the clear fact of
history that very often,
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the church was used by the
state to increase its power.
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Yeah. And, so we
can't, we can't allow religion
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to drift into that model again.
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Uh, uh, the state as you
say, they're very pragmatic.
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Pragmatically, if they
see that religious people
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are going to prostitute
their belief to help the state.
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That's a very sick sort of a--
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You know, because at the
end, it's a question of power.
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I need the power,
because I need to have
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more building, more
churches, or more institution,
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I need more money,
if the State help me.
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But of course,
the State say, "Okay,
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we will help you but
you have to help us too."
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Then you have a special
alliance with people and so on
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and then you have corruption,
we see that all the time.
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You know, the
church has not been called
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the church to be the
right hand of the state.
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And we have some
values to respect.
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One of these
values is the freedom.
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Nobody should be
forced to join a church,
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or to stay in a church, or
to believe, or not to believe.
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That's, you
know, according to God,
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that's something which is
personal, individual. Yeah.
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And every time you
have this kind of alliance,
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you have a
persecution of minorities.
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And of course, this is
why secularists in some way--
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It's a protection
against that alliance.
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Yes, because, you
know, the secularists defend,
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or they said to, that
they defend human rights.
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Because they say that
we are those who came with
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the idea of human rights,
which is not really true,
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but you know, let's say that.
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But now we say to them,
okay, we agree with you.
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We are in favor of human rights.
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But if you are in
favor of human rights,
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you have to protect
even religious minorities.
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And when you decide
that all religion is bad,
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you are no longer in
favor of human rights.
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It means it's easier
for us to defend our values
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and the freedom we defend.
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When we talk with
people who are secularized,
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people who are secular in
the context of secularization,
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then when you
talk in the context,
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in the religious context.
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Because when you talk
with religious leaders
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who are not in favor
of religious freedom,
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they will put in one side
the truths, we have the truths,
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we have the right
to impose our truths.
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You don't have. You are
heretic. You are bad people.
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You are leading
people outside of the truth.
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You have to be
neutralized or eliminated.
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So I think you've
given a very good argument,
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for what in these
seminars we really came
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to the conclusion that
well, it would be misleading
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for a Christian to
say that they are in favor
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of secularism
versus spirituality.
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But when we talk
about a civil structure,
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generally an
enlightened more open secularism
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is a more benign
environment for the practice
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of religious freedom,
than a more confessional state.
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I mean, that was the
story of the Middle Ages,
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persecution and narrow-minded
religious expression.
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You know, when religious
people are involved in politics,
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and when they change
religion into politics,
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they can become very
aggressive, very intolerant,
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because they have this
idea that we have the truth.
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And, if you're against
us, you are from the devil.
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And we don't
negotiate with the devil.
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But you know, now they
seem, having said that,
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we really, if we are in favor
like talking about government
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of a secular
moderate government,
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we are not in favor of
extreme secular government.
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It means that we are
in favor of something
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which is a kind of neutral.
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Well, extreme in the sense
of-- On the religious level.
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It tries to chase
religion out of civil society.
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That's, you know, that is
extreme, that's communism.
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In western society,
we are seeing not so much
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with the government,
but we're seeing societies
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where religion is,
is, there's an antagonism
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toward personal
faith and the practice
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of religious churches and so on.
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And of course, even
in the United States,
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being very difficult to
even build churches sometimes,
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because this society
doesn't want religion.
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Yeah. And also, yeah,
its happening all the time,
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you know, I heard that
some evangelicals leader
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talking about the
situation in Europe
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saying that,
yes, we have freedom.
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But when you ask
to build a church,
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it takes ten
years before receiving
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the right to build a new church.
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And of course, the
authorities can say that
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you need to have a park lots,
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you need to have
that, you need to have that.
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But in fact, they do
their best to stop the growing
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of religious organizations
or just to have more churches.
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That is, you know,
what we can find very often
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behind the idea of secularism.
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It's not just neutral
as we would like to be--
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It's antagonism. But it's,
yeah, it's against religion.
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When it is at this
level, we have of course,
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to react and we
cannot support that.
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Now you mentioned
Europe and of course,
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for people in the United
States, Europe is sort of
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the example of the
real danger of secularism,
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but at least the danger that
may come over to these shores.
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But what's happening in Europe
with the immigrants from--
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Muslim immigrants in particular,
who bring a radical--
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well, radical's the wrong word,
bring an all encompassing faith,
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where they have to pray
five times a day and to wear
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their religious clothing,
it's just an in-your-face
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religiosity for
a secular society.
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It is just the
opposite to what many,
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many secular people believe,
that religion is going down
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and down and down and
one day it will disappear.
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Because, you
know, ten years ago,
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20 years ago in
Europe, you had also Muslim,
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you had million Muslim
but they did not say anything.
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You know, they were,
they accepted to have
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a small mosque,
they accepted everything,
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they did not even go to mosque.
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It means, for
people, it did not exist.
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And suddenly, you have a
revival among the Muslim.
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And now they go to,
they go to the mosque.
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You know, a country like France,
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it was interesting, I
read these statistics.
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Maybe it should be
confirmed, but you know they say
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that 2.9 million of
French people go to the church,
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Christian church, on Sunday.
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2.9 % go to the
Christian church on Sunday.
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And there are you
know, there are 80-70
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or 60% of people
say they are Christian.
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Maybe more or less
50-55 say they are Catholics.
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Far less than
before, before it was 80-90%.
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They say 3.9% of
the French population
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go to the mosque every week.
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It means you have more
people going to the mosque
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practicing Islam, than
practicing Christianity.
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What does it mean?
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It reveals the state of
Christianity in the country.
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It has nothing to do
with secularism and so on.
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If you are a good
Christian, if you want to defend
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Christian values, you
have to go to your church
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or you have to
do to say something.
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But if you sit just
quietly, if you are sitting
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in your home chair and
just looking at--of course,
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of course, secularism or
Islam will dominate one day.
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Now there's two reactions
that are possible in Europe.
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One we've seen part of
where they're trying to
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enforce a radical
laicity or secularism.
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We've seen a bit of that.
Do you think it's possible that
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we'll see a rush
toward religiosity to counter
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this religious--surge
that is seen as not European?
00:10:40.51\00:10:48.19
Yeah, you know, what
we see in Europe today
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is more and more
evangelical churches are really
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full of people from
countries like Africa,
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South America,
especially Africa.
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And those who come from Africa,
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they don't care
about secularism.
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They need to pray God.
They need to be together.
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They need to build a church.
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And even if they have
problem, they have problem,
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they find another way.
00:11:11.95\00:11:13.31
But, you know,
that's also a new challenge
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for secularism to see
that oh my, these people,
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they come to the light and
they don't follow the light.
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They want to go to their church.
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That's something, I think you
cannot really destroy religion.
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All those who try, you
know, that's a big mistake.
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And at the end of the day,
religion is a personal thing,
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and the state is
best kept out of it.
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And I think God's spirit will
move on people as it always has.
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Yeah, this is what I think
that the best way to answer
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the challenge of secularism
is to be a better Christians.
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To live the
Christian values everyd ay,
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and to share with that.
00:11:47.55\00:11:49.37
And in this
society also, to defend
00:11:49.38\00:11:51.80
and to promote the Christian
values. This is our mission.
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We should not be
afraid about secularism.
00:11:54.73\00:11:58.06
Secularism
definitely presents a challenge.
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In the words of the poet
Matthew Arnold, who said that
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"The sea of faith
was once at the full,
00:12:06.93\00:12:10.18
but now I only hear its
melancholy retreating roar."
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We can see the same
in the modern world.
00:12:14.26\00:12:17.34
Secularism is in some ways
00:12:17.35\00:12:19.53
driving faith
out of public life.
00:12:19.54\00:12:21.76
But there's a
great irony as we look at
00:12:21.77\00:12:24.18
the history of
religious liberty,
00:12:24.19\00:12:25.70
that particularly
in the western world,
00:12:25.71\00:12:28.11
it's been the move towards
secularism that's enabled
00:12:28.12\00:12:31.73
the logic that's underpinned
00:12:31.74\00:12:33.62
the defense of
religious freedom.
00:12:33.63\00:12:36.80
As we've discussed so
often, a healthy secular society
00:12:36.81\00:12:40.90
can be an enabling
environment, indeed
00:12:40.91\00:12:43.41
a protective environment
for religious freedom.
00:12:43.42\00:12:46.05
What we do not want
is a cynical secularism,
00:12:46.06\00:12:50.14
an opposition to faith,
that is set to drive religion
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and faith and the practice
of religion out of existence.
00:12:55.61\00:12:59.13
That is a form of secularism
that too is on the rise.
00:12:59.14\00:13:03.04
We need to fight against that.
00:13:03.05\00:13:04.75
We need to make sure
that we always protect
00:13:04.76\00:13:07.96
our faith prerogative.
00:13:07.97\00:13:09.94
For Liberty Insider,
this is Lincoln Steed.
00:13:12.46\00:13:15.92