Manuel Ángel Rodríguez, City Hall representative of Oviedo, proposed the removal of nativities from any public building, specially schools. In 2009, Juan de Padilla school, in Toledo, suppressed every religious reference to Christmas but «Halloween», a foreign celebration to Spanish tradition, was welcomed. Nativity scenes and Christmas carols were replaced in the Toledo school, while decorated trees and the pagan character of Noel were permitted after two parents had complained about the religious connotation of the shepherds and the angels seen in the traditional manger.
The European Commission produced more than three million copies of an EU diary for secondary schools containing no reference to Christian festivals, but including those of Jewish, Hindu, Sikh and Muslim religions.
Peaceful protest of Catholic Youth pro-life Group "Jugend für das Leben“ violently attacked by pro-choice forces. Member hospitalised with concussion.
At a meeting on Freedom of Religion of OSCE/ODIHR in Vienna on Dec 9 and 10, the spokesperson of Wüstenstrom, a Christian NGO representing people with unwanted same-sex attractions, summarized a series of intolerance and attacks against them and their work. Find here the full text of his intervention.
A man destroyed much of the furniture of the Church of Gourin, probably on Sunday, December 5th in the afternoon. Benches, the harmonium, flower pots but also the altar, the tabernacle and stain glass windows were the targets.
Christian Mental Health worker suspended after talking to colleague informally about abortion risks and told „never to do this again“ and reinstated only several weeks later.
Radical groups forced the Archdiocese of Madrid to cancel a speech of Cardinal Antonio Maria Rouco Varela scheduled to be held at the Autonomous University of Madrid.
In Great Britain many converts from Islam to Christianity are forced to worship in secret at the risk of their own lives according to the report of the French Internet Portal “Observatoire de l’islamisation” which resulted in a report broadcasted 2010 on British TV.
A conservative party councillor in Bristol has been “voluntarily suspended” and asked by the party to meet with homosexualist activists after he objected to appearances by a homosexualist campaigner and actor, Sir Ian McKellen, at local schools.
Government funded atheist forum at the occasion of the Pope's visit to Barcelona concludes that "there was an increase of conflicts with a religious background, religious leaders used faith to subjugate the world, religious hierarchy attacked democracy, and religion restricted the exercise of freedom of conscience."
A small group of parents of Santo Angel School reported the School’s Catholic Center to the Ministry of Education of Murcia for "radical ideas” for organizing an optional weekly praying hour.
A Catholic national school found guilty of ''discrimination'' by Equality Tribunal and fined more than €12,000 for not hiring a Protestant teacher.
The lower Austrian main building of government (NÖ-Landhaus) hosts an exhibition which displays Mary, the mother of Jesus, covered in a condom and sperma. This exhibition is funded by public money and approved by governor Erwin Pröll.
An atheist father obtains the withdrawal of a crucifix in his son’s classroom in Regensburg (Bavaria, Germany) despite the opposition of the majority of parents. Morning prayer was changed to a neutral “Good Morning Circle”.
In a session the Government, the spokeswoman of Esquerra Republicana, Joan Ridao, has called the Catholic Church in Spain to be "a kind of sustained, a luxury tick" (“mantenida y garrapata”).
The Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Equality, the Generalitat of Catalonia, Barcelona City Council and La Caixa funded the Forum Libertat 2010 on the same days on which the historic visit of Pope Benedict XVI to Santiago and Barcelona took place. The Forum advocated the withdrawal of the public presence of the Catholic Church.
The parents of two students of the public school Ortega y Gasset in Almendralejo (Badajoz) succeeded in their campaign to remove crucifixes from classrooms and prohibit religious ceremonies. The school parent association, who opposes these decisions, called for a protest.
Saint-John’s parish near Avignon has been the target of a number of threats and intimidations: insulting tags in the church’s walls, feces thrown on the church, a young man even entered the church during mass, urinated and screamed to the parishioners: “we’ll toast you all in fire, you and your church”. A fire was also started in a tree growing against the church, probably in order to burn the church itself. Father Gabriel, the parish priest, regrets and condemns “an increasingly aggressive and violent climate”.
A group of male gay rights activists attacked members of the Orthodox youth movement "Georgievtsy!" outside the Council of Europe office in Moscow, who gathered against the European Court of Human Rights ruling declaring Russia's ban on gay pride marches illegal.
Msgr. Leonard faces accusations of homophobia for expressing controversial positions on the causes of HIV/AIDS.