France Has Problems With All Religions — Not Just Islam

[rug]

Jews Also Run Afoul of Anti-Clerical Bent



United in Memory: Hasidic men stand in the traditionally Jewish Marais neighborhood in Paris. (Getty)

By Robert Zaretsky
Published August 30, 2013, issue of September 06, 2013.

A couple of months ago, the French media reported on yet another clash between religious extremists and state authorities. Fifty boys from a private religious school near Paris arrived at a public lycée to take their final examination; however, when two women serving as their proctors met them, there was a standoff. The students, citing religious scruples, refused to enter the room. After a few tense minutes, the school authorities blinked first: They agreed to replace the two female proctors with men.

The students, by the way, were wearing yarmulkes.

This latest bulletin from the battered no-man’s land that lies between republican France and its religious radicals came to mind as I read René Guitton’s “La France des Intégristes.” The full title of the book, which was published recently in France, is best translated as “The Fundamentalists of France: The Repudiation of the Republic by Jewish, Christian and Muslim Extremists.” A well-known journalist, Guitton visits a series of fundamentalist religious communities in France, interviewing leaders as well as followers. By the end, he gives new life to the old chestnut that extremes always meet.

The funny thing about the word “intégrisme” — now almost always used to describe Muslim fundamentalists — is that it was first applied to fin-de-siècle French Catholics who had serious issues with modernity. By “modernity,” these Catholics understood the French Republic and its secular values. The Republic, after all, had yanked education from the hands of the church, brought an end to state support of the Catholic clergy, and opened politics and professions to Jews, Protestants and Freemasons. Not surprisingly, the extreme right-wing political thinker Charles Maurras, who saw himself as a defender of the faith, portrayed these same three groups as “les anti-France.”

http://forward.com/articles/183154/france-has-problems-with-all-religions-not-just/?p=all

[cbayer]

1. Despite the history outlined, they don't seem to have much of a problem with catholics.

[xfundy]

2. Have the French fundies learned from ours?

To constantly be on the lookout for something to get pissed off about, and, lacking something of that nature, to simply make up a "scandal" about how they're all "persecuted" and whatnot?

[rug]

3. Sounds like FFRF.

[dimbear]

4. FYI, by fin de siecle, the author means the end of the 19th century.

(There's been another one gone by, for what it was worth.) Catholic Modernism bit the dust right about then. It's a very interesting part of history with some remarkable heroes.

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/387278/Modernism

Some big names: Renan, Loisy. Still worth reading.

[rug]

5. Thank you. I thought it referred to a fish.

[dimbear]

6. Always glad to help. BTW, similar terms apply to various modern art movements, etc.

clustering around that point in time. Modernity must have been in fashion for a while.......back then.

[Jim__]

7. It's not clear from the article how big of a problem this is.

Is the article about a few incidents involving extremists? Or do these problems crop up in everyday life for the general populace? I have the impression it is more the former than the latter.

[rug]

8. I suspect it's the former.

I think he's trying to make the point that the culture clashes are not just with Islam.