nw08030 's List: Religion

• headscarves

• Swiss society has become more secular and the religious landscape more diverse.
• et religion seems to be making a comeback on the political stage, thanks to politicians from the rightwing Swiss People's Party

• construction of minarets in Switzerland looks sets to go to a nationwide vote after a group of rightwing politicians launched a campaign calling for a ban
• article 72 of the Swiss constitution, which allows the authorities to take appropriate measures to maintain the peace among different religious communitie
• People's Party parliamentarian Ulrich Schlüer,
• argues that the construction of minarets will create problems in communities and threaten the peace.
• minaret has nothing to do with religion
• ust symbolises a place where Islamic law is established
• issue of Islamic law, and its so-called "incompatibility" with Swiss law, that lies at the root of rightwingers' complaints about minarets
• have to respect that we have western-oriented liberal laws and that these laws are valid for everyone who wants to live her
• rightwing drive to force a nationwide vote on minarets is being seen as a major setback by the League of Swiss Muslims. Adel Méjri, the organisation's president, says the construction of minarets is not even a priority for Swiss Muslim
• Swiss justice minister and strongman of the People's Party, Christoph Blocher, invited around 20 members of the Muslim community for talks on integration and security
• report by the Federal Commission against Racism in September last year, which revealed that Swiss Muslims face discrimination in all walks of life – a situation that could be exacerbated by the minarets' affai
• Protestant and Catholic churches have rallied to the defence of the Muslim community, claiming the constitutional right to religious freedom allows the building of minarets

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• Swiss Muslims currently face the prospect of seeing the construction of minarets put to a nationwide vote
• Islam is seen as a threat
• absolute opposite in religious and cultural terms to the fundamentals of Swiss and European society.
• Hisham Maizar, president of the Federation of Islamic Organisations in Switzerland
• big increase numbers, coupled with a failure to fully integrate, also goes against the country's Muslims
• Alfred Donath, president of the Swiss Federation of Jewish Communities,
• so many more [Muslims] than in other non-Swiss religions. This is part of the reason why the Swiss have a certain fear of Muslims: that too many could change the demographic balance,
• ismisses as "utter nonsense" claims that Muslims have failed to integrate
• "More than 50 per cent of Muslims here are under 25. These are the second generation and they differ completely from their parents in that they are assimilated," said Maizar
• want is to be accepted as human beings and to be integrated as Swiss citizens. But what we are seeing at the moment can only serve to alienate them.

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• president of the Swiss Council of Religions
• Thomas Wip
• president of the Federation of Swiss Protestant Churches
• arrival of Muslims: we now have people with very different traditions and values
• we don't have a consensus on these values. Catholics and Protestants in Switzerland have a common base: our culture and languages share something. But now we have neighbours whose basic values aren't all the same as ours
• minarets
• some groups want to tap into the uncertainties and fears of people as the country's Muslim population grows.

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• Education and integration are the best remedies for fundamentalism

• House of Representatives has come out against a proposal by rightwing political parties to ban minarets

• Supporters of a ban on the construction of minarets in Switzerland have handed in the necessary signatures to force a nationwide ballo