The role of Religious Communities/Institutions in the public political

sphere: historical reflection and modern perspectives

Introduction
The issue of the relationship of religious communities or institutions is now being
approached based on the political and social perceptions as they have been shaped
in the modern world. In particular, the issue of human rights, but especially the
demand for religious freedom, is what played a key role in shaping the new
perceptions of the relations of the state with the religious communities. Of course,
we must bear in mind that in order to establish these relations, we must always take
into account the political, social and economic conditions at local and international
level. Clearly, such a matter is the continuing movement of populations, which alter
the composition of societies and set a new variable in approaching this issue.
At the same time, the various religious institutions seek to establish and
strengthen their position in the society in which they operate and seek to maintain
close relations with the State, especially in cases where they seem to retain the
majority within the population. An interesting example is the case of Hinduism,
where in its modern form, voices developed that pushed the State to recognize
Hinduism as the official national religion of India. It is clear that such a pursuit can
cause tensions among religious groups, as the strong religious group may put
pressure on minorities and devalue them, concerning their rights to the law. Thus,
there is often the phenomenon where religious communities with an apparent
majority demand legal protection from the state, although they should not have
chosen this strategy because theoretically the majority of them are a guarantee of
security. On the other hand, when a religious community is considered a minority, it
invokes the application of human rights. For this reason, those religious groups who
are numerically major should have greater tolerance and understanding of the rights
of religious minorities, since in a similar position may be people of the same religion
that live in other societies where they do not enjoy the numerical majority. However,
fanaticism and absolutism are a common approach to the issues of religious
institutions.

1. Politics and Religion

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 In any case, it is of particular interest to see how the relations between the State
and the religious communities have historically formed, in order to better
understand how the perceptions of this relationship have been established and
shaped in the modern world.
It is characteristic that in the traditional societies there was a normal connection
of the state with religion, whether it had a special place in the administration and
the structure or was used for the ideological legitimacy of the State by religion. But
in the modern world many things have changed and diversified this mentality,
leading to a redefinition of relations between the State and the religious
communities. Of course, we must be careful not to confuse the issue of relations
between the State and the religious communities and that between religion and
politics. In the modern world, it is different how a religious group faces political
power and whether religious beliefs can influence the political attitude of what the
state's relations with the religious group will be and in which legislative framework
they are established.
Regarding the issue of the relationship between religion and politics in modern
times, we find that politics has been completely separated from religion, since it is
not understood by religion and is not legitimized by religious leaders. Regarding the
issue of the state's relations with the communities, it is known that various systems
have been established that have passed through various phases until they are
consolidated. For this reason, it is useful to see how these perceptions have
historically been drawn, but stressing that the state's relations with religious
institutions now depend on the framework defined by the declarations on human
rights and religious freedom and not on the desires and demands of religious
institutions, especially those who are in a majority position in a local society.
Therefore, the relations of the State with the religious communities depend on the
way the state faces the citizens and the religious groups in its territory.

2. Historical reflection
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 We will therefore briefly try to examine how the relationship of the State with
the religious institutions and the Church in particular evolved historically, which can
help to see how the perceptions have been shaped on this issue.
During the first Christian centuries, there was no clear attitude or arrangement
for the relations of the State with the Church. The position of Christ is characteristic
“Then give back to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that
are God’s” (Mt. 22,21), which clearly distinguishes the religious institution from the
state. Christ's demystifying attitude to Roman authority and the negative perception
of it by Christians led to their persecution by the Roman authority. This situation was
completed by the Edict of Milan (313), which was issued by Licinius and Constantine
the Great, and religious freedom was first established and allowed Christians to
publicly and freely perform their worship. Later, in 381 Christianity was recognized
as the only religion of the state by Emperor Theodosius the Great.
Subsequently, in Byzantium, the Church was essentially submissive to the State
with the Emperor having the final say in many critical decisions of the Ecumenical
Synods concerning doctrine, many of which were state laws. The emperor decided to
elect bishops and patriarchs, despite any reactions from ecclesiastical factors. The
bottom line is that the Byzantine state dealt with political power in a theocratic way,
and the whole administration of the church followed changes in political affairs.
Generally, the Church in the East never exercised political command.
On the contrary, in the West it has gradually begun to emphasize the primacy of
the Church of Rome in the Christian world, leading to the construction of teachings
with theological cloak in order to support Pope’s supremacy not only within the
Church but also at the political level. The Pope became the head of state since 754,
bringing political and ecclesiastical power to his authority. Since then, the Church of
Rome had begun to present Christian teachings in theoretical terms and sought to
exercise political power by intervening in the affairs of the great nation states. Thus,
an understanding of subjugation of secular to spiritual power and the service of the
interests of the second from the former was established. This situation has provoked
the reaction of national states and the decline of the authority of the Pope, which
has contributed to the development of new religious movements that have shaped
the modern world, as the Reformation.
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 During the Reformation, new independent Christian communities emerged,
which claimed to represent the one and original Church. There was a rupture in the
West and it was established the principle “cuius regio eius religio”, which offered the
possibility to the citizens either to remain faithful to the Roman Catholic Church or to
establish reformed churches in their states or refuse to identify themselves with
some of the known Christian confessions. The above principle, which said that the
citizens had to follow the ruler's faith, began to cause problems in terms of the
ruler's interference, resulting in religious wars in the 16 th and 17th centuries. From
the 18th century began to develop views on the separation of the state from the
church and philosophical views that gave birth to ideas of tolerance. Modern
political developments gave birth to the ideas of human rights and tolerance of the
other, even in states that had expressed some confessional preference. But it is
interesting to see how this relationship was understood and developed in other
countries, such as Eastern Europe and the United States.
In particular, in Russia after the establishment of the Patriarchate in 1593, the
Russian Patriarch was the second person in the hierarchy under the Tsar. In 1652
Patriarch Nikon wanted to be imposed and recognized as the first person. This
situation brought the intervention of Peter the Great, who in 1721 brought reforms
and determined the Church to be governed by a permanent session, and for all its
decisions it would need the consent of the imperial commissioner. Church
administration and church and state relations were based on the Protestant model,
which was adapted in the case of Russia. The Church's attempt to regain its old
privileges was halted by the establishment of the status of socialism, following an
anti-religious policy, abolishing all privileges of the Church and confiscating
ecclesiastical property. After World War II, the situation gradually improved, anti-
religious propaganda was abolished and many temples were returned. At the time of
the perestroika, many freedoms were recognized in the church, and the new law on
religions has been in force since the 1990s.
There is no official religion in the US, and all religious communities are considered
private associations that are maintained by their own means. They are recognized by
the country on the basis of the voluntary participation of their members and their
rights are protected by the USA. Of course, the rights and freedoms of religious
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communities are determined by laws that differ from state to state, but there is
generally the notion that human rights are human freedoms, which the US has to
protect.
There are different systems in the European Union that define the state's
relations with religious communities and this depends on the diversity of cultures
and nations. Clearly, all these systems are based on Christianity despite their
different origins, and we must not forget the existence of other religious
communities, such as Islam and Judaism, that have had and have a significant
presence in various European countries. There are currently three systems of state
and church relations. The first system is characterized by the existence of a "state"
church, where there are connections between the state and the church, despite the
differences from country to country. The second system is dominated by the
complete separation between the state and the church, while in the third system
there is a basic separation between the state and the church, which means that
some common goals and activities are recognized between the two institutions. In
any case, the change in social conditions and the emergence of new religious
communities leads to the search for new solutions to the relations of the State with
these communities, especially in the case of the countries in the "state" church
system, where it seeks a way of releasing the state from the church. In all countries
of the European Union, the right to freedom of religion is recognized, which allows
other religious communities to exist and function and citizens to freely determine
their faith. In the legal framework, the EU integrates them with NGOs, although they
react and seek to belong to a particular category of religious associations, so that
they are neither public nor private.

3. Modern Perspective
Before we look at the modern perspective and the possibilities that exist for the
relationship between the religious institutions and the State, we must comment on
some basic points from the above brief historical review. Whenever a religious
community sought to impose its position on society and the public political sphere,
its role was strongly challenged. The examples of the Roman Catholic Church and the
Russian Church, which eventually led to the Reformation and Churches of the

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Reformation, and Russia's intervention and reform of the Church by the State, are
known. The challenge of the Church of the West came from other reasons, but the
main problem was the pursuit of power. On the other hand, this situation was not
observed in the East, because the Church was subjected to the state, but from the
Ottoman era, and then the framework for the acquisition of political responsibilities
was favored. However, this development in this field of the Orthodox Church later
led to the development of secularization in Greece and elsewhere and the formation
of anti-literary tendencies. It is characteristic that when there is a pursuit from the
ecclesiastical space to conquer other fields of public life, then it is caused in the long
run a reaction and conflict from society.
So we ended up in the modern age to create a framework that leads to the
separation of the State from the religious communities and institutions. If this
separation is not achieved then it is necessary to clearly define the position of the
religious institutions and to emphasize that they should not interfere with political
issues. I will conclude this lecture by referring to the reasons for this separation.
The first reason is the freedom of man in the conscious choice of religion.
Religion cannot be imposed by the state and is a personal choice. The concepts of
democracy and human rights lead to the issue of the relations of the state with the
religious institutions. The religious institution, which is totally connected to the state
and calls for its imposition on the people from the state, then ignores the people and
does not wish to come in contact with them.
The second reason is that the state's relations with religious communities should
be based on religious freedom. The State should treat its citizens equally irrespective
of religion. This means that it must treat all religious communities in the same way,
regardless of the majority and minority. But if there is no equal treatment then a
discriminative situation is established. That is why we point out that human rights
issues should not be subject to majority and enforcement procedures. In essence,
detaching the State from a particular religion will give the powerful religious majority
the opportunity to communicate frankly with society about the crucial and modern
problems that concern it and to work with the State on various issues on an agreed
basis. Also, the association and close relationship of a religious community with the
State does not allow the renewal and improvement of religious communities'
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legislation, and it also causes a problem for the powerful religious community as it
does not help it to develop and adapt to modern circumstances. When religious
communities are treated equally by the State, this does not mean that the religion or
religious tradition of a place is being persecuted, but on the contrary, the religious
freedom of all citizens is guaranteed and safeguarded. Besides, the purpose of the
State is to treat citizens as citizens and not as believers of one or other religious
tradition.
The third and final reason is that the close relationship of a religious community
with the State essentially hinders the work of the community itself. Close
relationship and security with the state is in fact an obstacle to open a sincere
dialogue with society and having the state as its cover, usually responds to the
demands of society in an aggressive manner. On the other hand, the lack of serious
dialogue leads in many cases to sending more requests for legal protection and
safeguard. However, this attitude cancels out the spiritual role and the real
reformation that can succeed in society. Finally, usually the churches in the
European area should be relieved of the sick perception of the past, which also gives
an ideological interpretation of history. The acquittance from this perception and
dependency in many cases from the State may trigger the positive presence of
religious communities in the modern world.