August 21, 2010

Cardinal Karl Lehmann has insisted that Islam cannot be declared "completely equal" to Christianity in Germany. The former head of the German bishops' conference was speaking in an interview with the Austrian daily the Salzburger Nachrichten.

In Salzburg to receive the Tolerance Award of the European Academy of Sciences and Arts on 15 August, Cardinal Lehmann said: "Naturally Islam should be recognised as a legitimate religion in our society, but declaring it completely equal [to the Christian Churches] would mean assuming that it had had the same history and inculturation and was therefore in exactly the same situation. This can at most be a process during which Islam puts down firmer roots in our country."

When he was asked about the building of mosques and minarets in Germany, Cardinal Lehmann said the German bishops' conference had pronounced "clearly" that this must be a matter for negotiation among the parties concerned. He acknowledged that in several Muslim countries Christians were not allowed to build churches and were often even persecuted, but insisted that a "tit-for-tat" response was not the right solution. "We must practise the religious freedom guaranteed in our societies in such a way that we can expect a certain understanding for some of our worries," the cardinal said.

Asked whether religions were almost by definition intolerant as they claimed to possess the truth, Cardinal Lehmann pointed out that truth and freedom did not exclude each other as was often thought. "Our view today, based on the [Second Vatican] Council Declaration on Religious Liberty [Dignitatis Humanae], is that of a balanced relationship between truth and freedom," he said. There were no "automatic" safeguards against fundamentalist and even terrorist religious views, but the basic attitude must be a genuine willingness to understand opinions which differed from one's own, and, if at all possible, to dialogue with those who held different opinions. "Exchanges must therefore be carried out with this willingness to understand and without using any kind of force, even if the opinions of the other party remain very foreign to us."

Tolerance was not merely a "laissez-faire" attitude, Cardinal Lehmann stressed, but one that is much more conscious and deliberate. "It doesn't just mean accepting otherness, but rather freely respecting different opinions and courses of action, always provided that the other party also agrees to non-violence and a similar tolerance.

"Understanding others, reciprocal rapprochement and joint responsibility are three aspects of tolerance that are of primary importance. The limits of tolerance are identical with the basic rights of our constitution and the recognition of human rights," Cardinal Lehmann underlined.

Recalling that Cardinal Lehmann had criticised the lifting of Lefebvrist Bishop Richard Williamson's excommunication, his interviewer asked him what things the Church must not tolerate. Cardinal Lehmann replied, "The recognition of religious liberty is one of the very questions being discussed in the ongoing dialogue with the SSPX [Lefebvrists] in Rome. The exchanges with the Lefebvrists must deepen the understanding of the relationship between truth and freedom, which co-exist. The prerequisite for this, however, is recognition of the Council Declaration on Religious Liberty." Dignitatis Humanae declares: .".. while the religious freedom which men demand ... has to do with freedom from coercion in civil society, it leaves intact the traditional Catholic teaching on the moral duty of individuals and societies towards the true religion and the one Church of Christ."

Teddy Kollek, the late mayor of Jerusalem, Archbishop Gabriel Kassab, formerly Bishop of Basra and Southern Iraq and now Bishop of the Chaldean Catholic Church for Australia and New Zealand, and the late Cardinal Franz König are among former winners of the Tolerance Award.

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