ADDRESS BY THE PRESIDENT OF MALTA

H.E. DR. EDWARD FENECH ADAMI

AT CONFERENCE ENTITLED “RELIGION AND EDUCATION: THE POSSIBILITY OF DEVELOPING TOLERANCE THROUGH THE TEACHING OF RELIGIOUS FACTS”

 AULA MAGNA, OLD UNIVERSITY BUILDING, VALLETTA 

TUESDAY, 18 MAY 2004

The Constitution proposed by the European Convention in its Preamble merely acknowledges the “inspiration” provided by religion in the formation of Europe’s identity.  Later on, however, article 51 recognizes that the regulation of church-state relations, and therefore implicitly, of religious education, falls within the competence of the member states and not of the European institutions.  This very significant provision clearly implies that there are several and various ways in which religious education can be imparted even in state schools compatibly with the freedom of religion proclaimed as a fundamental right in the second part of the Constitution. 

The enunciation of these constitutional principles amply demonstrates not only the scope but also the need of a conference such as yours.  The question clearly arises for each member state, and also for non-member states, as to how best religion can be taught not only in accord with the fundamental right of religious freedom but also in pursuit of the common political good. 

I have not yet had the possibility to examine the conclusions that you have reached in answer to this many-sided question, not even as summed up by the previous speaker.  Whatever they are, I am sure they have been worked out in order to serve the ideal of tolerance to which I have already paid tribute as one premiss of your thinking.  I also feel that the farewell words to be spoken by me on behalf of the Maltese nation to all of you who have honoured us with your presence and wisdom over the past few days should be a renewed exaltation of that ideal.  Traditional grounds – and not merely post-modernist grounds – can be invoked in its support.

There is unfortunately a very widespread belief nowadays that the only rational foundation for church-state relations in a democratic political system is a kind of social contract.  According to this contract, the adherents of a religious or philosophical creed agree not to use the power of the state in support of their creed in return for the adherents of other creeds also refraining from using it in support of theirs. 

This mutual hands-off approach in reality contrasts with that of the founding fathers of liberal democracy, such as John Locke, in their advocacy of religious toleration.  Locke defended toleration on the religious ground that faith would only be authentic if free, while he thought that limits on toleration could sometimes be justified for political reasons; for instance – Locke believed – Roman Catholics in England should be tolerated only in a limited way, not because of their religious beliefs, but because they had political loyalties to foreign powers.  Locke may well have been wrong about this particular case; but his general defence of political toleration on religious grounds is surely much more convincing than the contemporary argument which defends religious neutrality by the state on the basis of a wholly abstract, contractual political theory.

The two sides of this position – political recognition of the positive virtues of cultural and religious pluralism on the one side and the grounding of this recognition on the nature of religion itself – a position generally accepted in Malta, explain why we consider your endeavours to be of the greatest importance and why we are eager to continue to support their pursuit along the lines that you have set.