PERMITTED RELIGIONS. — By this designation, Italian legislation, from June 1929 until 1943 (and, exceptionally, even thereafter: cf. decree-laws of 7 June 1946 no. 581 and 30 May 1947 no. 604), referred to religions other than the Catholic religion whose practice was permitted in Italy.
Although Art. 1 of the Italian Statute of 1848 declared that the Catholic religion was the sole religion of the State and that other religions were merely tolerated, in practice Italian legislation prior to the Concordat had come to establish an almost complete equality of all religions before the State. With the Conciliation, matters changed in part.
Having reaffirmed in Art. 1 of the Lateran Treaty the principle that the sole religion of the State is the Catholic, apostolic, Roman religion, a special law (24 June 1929, no. 1159) regulated the juridical position of the other religions, which in that law were for the first time called p. r.
Not all religions other than the Catholic religion, however, were permitted, but only those that did not profess principles or follow rites contrary to public order and good morals (Art. 1 of the aforementioned law).
It also established that the practice, including public practice, of such religions was free (ibid.). However, as the minister of justice explained in the report, “the permission granted to followers of non-Catholic religions to devote themselves freely to religious practices according to their own convictions does not mean that the State is indifferent in religious matters, still less that it adheres to the doctrines of such religions. It is instead the pure and simple consequence of the general principle of public law that every activity which is not contrary to the fundamental requirements of society and the State must be deemed lawful and, as such, permitted and protected by law. The State, that is, while professing the Catholic religion, which is the religion of almost the entire Italian population, allows, permits, admits, and therefore also protects the practice of other religions, whenever no harm results to the essential principles governing the life of the State.”
For the public practice of permitted religions, the faithful of each religion may have their own temple or oratory, the opening of which is subject to prior governmental authorization. In these buildings open for worship, the respective faithful may freely hold public meetings for the performance of religious ceremonies or other acts of worship, provided that the meeting is presided over or authorized by a minister of religion whose appointment has been approved by the government (Arts. 1–2 of R. D. 28 February 1930, no. 289).
Ministers of permitted religions may be authorized to visit places of care or retreat in order to provide religious assistance to inmates who request II. Authorization is granted by whoever is responsible for the administrative direction of the place of care or retreat, and must specify the procedures and precautions according to which the assistance is to be provided (Art. 5 of the cited R. D.).
Ministers of permitted religions may be authorized to provide religious assistance to inmates in preventive-detention or penal institutions whenever requested by the inmates, their relatives, or whoever has legal guardianship over them, subject to compliance with the rules contained in the special regulations for those institutions (Art. 6 of the R. D.).
In the event of mobilization of the armed forces of the State, the military authority entrusted with supreme direction of military operations may authorize ministers of religion whose appointment has been approved to provide religious assistance to non-Catholic soldiers; the same authority establishes the rules and precautions according to which such assistance may be provided (Art. 8 of the R. D.).
Various provisions, analogous to those established for Catholic ecclesiastical entities, are laid down for the legal recognition (for civil purposes) and the activities of entities and institutions of permitted religions; for the tax-equivalence of the purpose of worship with purposes of charity and education; and for deferment of or exemption from military service in favor of ministers of religion or persons destined to become such (Arts. 7, 9, and 12 of the cited R. D.; Art. 632 of the regulation approved by R. D. 3 April 1942, no. 1133, for students of certain Protestant theological faculties).
With regard to religious instruction in public schools, in order to prevent non-Catholics from being compelled to attend Catholic religious instruction, it is established that parents, or those acting in their stead, may request exemption for their children from attending the aforesaid courses. In certain cases, when the number of pupils warrants it and the temple cannot be used for this purpose, fathers of families professing a non-Catholic religion may obtain the use of a schoolroom for the religious education of their children, subject to appropriate precautions (Art. 23 of the R. D.).
Special provisions are also established concerning the celebration of marriage for non-Catholics; in fact, a marriage celebrated before one of the ministers of permitted religions whose appointment has been approved produces, from the day of its celebration, the same effects as a marriage celebrated before the civil-status registrar, provided that the minister of religion has been duly authorized by the competent civil-status registrar and that the marriage certificate is regularly transcribed in the civil-status registers (it would take too long to discuss the other minor formalities, which are likewise essential). This marriage, however, unlike one celebrated before a Catholic priest (which is governed by canon law), is, for the State, governed entirely by civil law; and consequently all the provisions established for a marriage celebrated before the civil-status registrar also apply to it, including those concerning nullity and dissolution. There is therefore only one difference between a purely civil marriage and a non-Catholic marriage: the substitution of the minister of religion for the civil-status registrar (Arts. 8–13 of the law and Arts. 25–28 of the R. D.; cf. Art. 122 of the law of war, concerning marriage by proxy).
Permitted religions too, although to a lesser degree than the Catholic religion, enjoy criminal-law protection. The Penal Code, although it does not punish abstract contempt for a permitted religion, does punish anyone who publicly offends one of the permitted religions by showing contempt for those who profess it; anyone who, during religious functions performed by a minister of religion, or in a place intended for worship, or in a public place or one open to the public, offends one of the permitted religions by showing contempt for objects that constitute the subject of worship, or are consecrated to worship, or are necessarily intended for the exercise of worship; and anyone who prevents or disturbs the exercise of religious functions, ceremonies, or practices performed with the assistance of a minister of religion, or in a place intended for worship, or in a public place or one open to the public. The penalties established for these offenses are somewhat less severe than those established for anyone who commits the same acts against the Catholic religion (Arts. 403–406 of the Penal Code).
It is likewise held that the usurpation of the ecclesiastical dress proper to a permitted religion falls under the provision of Art. 498 of the Penal Code.
Two other important provisions, although strictly speaking they do not concern non-Catholic religions, but rather all citizens from the standpoint of their profession of faith, are also found in the aforementioned law on c. a. One is contained in art. 4 of the law, according to which “difference of religion shall not constitute an exception to the enjoyment of civil and political rights or to eligibility for civil and military offices.” This principle, already present in Law no. 735 of 19 June 1848, reaffirms the equality of citizens before the law, whatever religion they profess; and it was reproduced in the new Constitution, which provides in art. 3: “All citizens have equal social dignity and are equal before the law, without distinction... of religion.”
The other provision is that of art. 5 of the aforementioned law on c. a., which states: “discussion in religious matters is completely free,” reproducing a provision contained in art. 2, fourth paragraph, of the Law of Guarantees.
These principles have been considerably broadened in the new Constitution, which, after implicitly proclaiming in art. 7 that the Catholic religion is the religion of the State, nevertheless adds in art. 8 that “all religious confessions are equally free before the law,” and that “religious confessions other than the Catholic one have the right to organize themselves according to their own statutes, provided that they do not conflict with the Italian legal order.” The same Constitution further affirms that “everyone has the right to profess freely his or her own religious faith in any individual or collective form, to propagate it, and to exercise its worship in private or in public, provided that these are not rites contrary to public morality” (art. 19). There is no longer any mention of “principles” or of public order.
Moreover, the third paragraph of art. 8 of the Constitution introduces a new principle into the Italian legal order by requiring the legislature—which previously had the power, but not the obligation, to do so—to regulate the relations of non-Catholic confessions with the State “by law on the basis of agreements with their respective representatives.”