The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is not among more than 100 religious groups that could have their activities severely curtailed in France if legislation now being considered by that nation's parliament is approved.
A story in Saturday's Atlanta Journal-Constitution said the church was one of 173 religious "sects or cults" that French lawmakers want to rein in under a proposed law that would restrict the activities of faith groups so labeled. Other print media picked up on the story, and additional reports have circulated on the Internet.
While there is real concern about the legislation among religious freedom advocates and leaders of many faiths, the LDS Church isn't named as one of the potentially restricted groups, according to Cole Durham, a professor of law at Brigham Young University.
Durham, in France Tuesday attending a religious freedom conference, Durham said the erroneous report of LDS Church involvement grew out of a list that was circulated years ago and not the current list of groups that many in the French government consider "dangerous," according to French news accounts.
A letter written by a member of the French National Assembly, Alain Gest, to an LDS Church member in France back in 1996 also confirms that the church "does not appear on the list of those qualified as sectarian by the commission for research on sects." A copy of that letter was provided to the Deseret News by the LDS Church Tuesday.
Church spokesman Dale Bills said the church "is aware of proposed legislation in France regarding religious liberties. This is not a new issue, not unlike similar challenges elsewhere in Europe and other parts of the world. Church leaders continue to work with French government officials to improve understanding among all involved. Our members and missionaries in France have a long history of rendering meaningful service to their communities."
Joseph Grieboski, president of the Institute on Religion and Foreign Policy, Washington, D.C., said those targeted by the proposed law include three well-known Catholic organizations, along with Scientologists and Jehovah's Witnesses.
Grieboski said another problem with the measure is that "there is no published definition of what defines a sect, according to French authorities."
The proposed law seeks to ban the named groups from opening missions or seeking new members near public places like hospitals, schools and retirement homes. The most controversial provision of the measure seeks to criminalize "mental manipulation," a term so broad that even many of the country's mainstream religious groups not targeted by the proposal have expressed grave concern about it.
The measure also would allow the government to dissolve religious organizations whose leaders are convicted of two or more crimes.
Durham, an internationally known specialist in religious freedom, said the proposed law is definitely troublesome. The fact that the LDS Church is not targeted is "actually quite significant because these lists have caused tremendous problems for a lot of other groups. People who care about religious liberty issues in general are not so concerned about whether it's our particular church that's being targeted. These other groups have felt stigmatized by this, have had difficulty renting halls. There are all kinds of ways this has caused discrimination" and problems for them.
The backdrop for the proposed law comes out of a mass suicide a few years ago by members of a group called the "Solar Temple," similar to what occurred with the Heaven's Gate sect in California in 1997.
"It has created a lot of fear and anxiety about dangerous sects," Durham said. "There are some active organizations trying to draw attention to sects and spreading concerns about them. This plays into some kind of stereotypical accounts of what sects are like, how they brainwash people and do bad things to them.
"It captures their imagination and stirs people's fears. I think there is some overreaction going on in France, and there has been some in Germany, but I think it's calming down. We had some in the United States in the late '70s and early '80s. Americans basically let normal religious liberty principles apply and the concerns have died down."
The LDS Church has had a presence in France since 1849 and organized a branch with eight members there in 1850. At the end of 1997, there were 30,000 church members and three missions established there.
In France, Grieboski said, support for the measure is so heavy that "I expect that the legislation will pass overwhelmingly. Part of the problem is that so much of the opposition to it has been American, and there's a cultural attitude now saying that 'if Americans don't like it, we must be doing something right.' "
Grieboski said the proposal is frightening because it synthesizes what he believes is an "almost militant anti-religiosity spreading throughout western Europe that is influencing the emerging democracies of central and eastern Europe. In particular when we've raised the issue (of religious freedom) with the Russians, they say that they've seen (proposals to curb such freedoms) with the French and the Germans.
"Our biggest concern with the legislation is not just what it will do to individual religious groups in France but as a model for the rest of the world. If a bastion of liberal democratic society like France will limit the religious expression of its own citizens, what does that say to all of those central European countries now developing laws on the relationship between church and state?"
Durham agreed that is his biggest concern about the measure as well. The proposal does provide for judicial review of any enforcement action and because France has a proven legal system in place, the chance of abuse there decreases, he said. But emerging democracies don't have that kind of judicial precedent and if the overly-broad measure became law in such nations, "there is a tremendous risk that it would lead to human rights violations.
"I hope that it will be narrowed before it's passed. It has widely raised some serious concerns, even though the French maintain it will be applied in reasonable ways."
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