Italy’s far-right government is seeking to crack down on schools that scrap Christian nativity scenes in order to reflect greater religious diversity.
A draft law introduced on Wednesday seeks to protect the country’s “cultural roots” by promoting “traditional” Christmas and Easter celebrations.
“For some years now we have witnessed unacceptable and embarrassing decisions by some schools that ban nativity scenes or modify the deep essence of Christmas by transforming it into improbable winter festivities so as not to offend believers of other religions,” said Lavinia Mennuni, a senator for the ruling Brothers of Italy party, who introduced the bill.
“Allowing the transformation of the Sacred Christian holidays into another anonymous type of celebration would constitute discrimination against the students and their families practicing the majority religion as well as an attack on the values and the deepest tradition of our people,” the draft text reads.
Riccardo Magi, secretary of the left-wing More Europe party, wrote on X (formerly Twitter) that the Brothers of Italy’s proposal “should offend all believers, as well as being unconstitutional because it contradicts freedom of worship”.
“Instead of governing the country, a duty they [the Brothers of Italy] don’t know how to manage, they continue to use ‘weapons of distraction’ like this law against principals who agree to the removal of the nativity scene at school,” said Luana Zanella from the Green Europe party.
The original article contains 399 words, the summary contains 228 words. Saved 43%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Italy’s far-right government is seeking to crack down on schools that scrap Christian nativity scenes in order to reflect greater religious diversity.
A draft law introduced on Wednesday seeks to protect the country’s “cultural roots” by promoting “traditional” Christmas and Easter celebrations.
“For some years now we have witnessed unacceptable and embarrassing decisions by some schools that ban nativity scenes or modify the deep essence of Christmas by transforming it into improbable winter festivities so as not to offend believers of other religions,” said Lavinia Mennuni, a senator for the ruling Brothers of Italy party, who introduced the bill.
“Allowing the transformation of the Sacred Christian holidays into another anonymous type of celebration would constitute discrimination against the students and their families practicing the majority religion as well as an attack on the values and the deepest tradition of our people,” the draft text reads.
Riccardo Magi, secretary of the left-wing More Europe party, wrote on X (formerly Twitter) that the Brothers of Italy’s proposal “should offend all believers, as well as being unconstitutional because it contradicts freedom of worship”.
“Instead of governing the country, a duty they [the Brothers of Italy] don’t know how to manage, they continue to use ‘weapons of distraction’ like this law against principals who agree to the removal of the nativity scene at school,” said Luana Zanella from the Green Europe party.
The original article contains 399 words, the summary contains 228 words. Saved 43%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!