Source: CT

Now, it’s quite possible to argue that this is just a recognition that the state is historically Christian (and Catholic, actually) – as Bavaria’s chief minister Markus Söder does. But that’s not how it’s being seen by many Christians today. According to Evangelical Focus, a survey in Bild Am Sonntag found 64 per cent of the population is against the move, including 62 per cent of Protestants and 48 per cent of Catholics.

An open letter from the Union of Young Catholics and the youth wing of the EKD, the main Protestant church, said: ‘As young Christians we are shocked.’ It continued, ‘the Christian symbol of the salvation of God for everyone is being used to draw limits and exclude people’, adding that the political use of this Christian symbol leads to ’emptying its theological meaning’.

This is precisely correct. It is not, in fact, the first time a European government has tried it – Italy fought a long-running battle to be allowed to display crucifixes in schools that ended up in the European Court of Human Rights, which found in its favour in 2011. Again, it was fiercely resisted by the country’s Protestants, who saw the imposition of a Catholic symbol as discriminatory and offensive.

The question of how the state should use religious symbols has been an ongoing and controversial feature of US life, too. The notorious Judge Roy Moore, who lost a Senate election last year amid a welter of accusations about sexual misconduct, was better known for refusing to remove a granite monument depicting the Ten Commandments from state property. He was removed from office, but his case was a rallying-point for conservatives who wanted to assert the Christian character of the country.

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