No Reference to God or Christianity in EU Constitution

Country: European Institutions (EU, ECHR, et.al.)

Date of incident: January 1, 2006


(2003 - 2006) Reference to God or Christianity in EU Constitution denied despite 1 million individual signatures as well as 50 million signatures through organisiational affiliation.

The preamble of the debated European constitution neither includes a reference to God (even though several consitutions of member states do) nor a reference to the Christian heritage of Europe. Instead, as historic reference point, the enlightenment is mentioned. Europe's Christian history is not a matter of faith but one of fact. It is christianophobic not to recognize what is evident by reason. One million individual signatures as well as 50 million signatures through organisiational affiliation were collected and not taken into consideration. Jewish legal scholar and professor at New York University Joseph Weiler: "When half the population of Europe lives under constitutions which make explicit references to God and Christianity, the exclusion of any such reference made a mockery of Europe’s motto ‘United in Diversity’. Yes, so long as that diversity does not include God or Christianity. How many times does one have to reject the canard that exclusion of God from the symbology of the State and from the public square is not a neutral choice – it is a political choice for one world view over another. I asked Mr. Giscard1: Where were you on the question of the Invocatio Dei or of Christian roots. And he said he was in favor. But there was no consensus, and they were operating by consensus. Yes, there was no consensus. But why should the default be exclusion? And I asked Mr. Giscard d’Estaing: “Why didn’t you put in an Invocatio Dei, which you say you believe in, and then say: ‘I can’t take it out, because there is no consensus to take it out.’” Why should the default be French laicité, and not the German belief in the responsibility before God and man, the Irish belief in the authority coming from the Holy Trinity or the altogether elegant Polish solution, which recognizes both." Full text: http://www.europe4christ.net/fileadmin/media/pdf/english/Letter_for_Europe_9.pdf