Mosebach: Make Blasphemy Punishable Under Law

The Roman Catholic novelist and essayist Martin Mosebach cheered when then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger expelled or excommunicated theologians and activists from the Church for blasphemous or heretical ideas.  But what to do about non-Catholics who insult the Church?  Recently the humor magazine Titanic caused a mini-scandal by having an incontinent Pope Benedict XIV on its cover.  That was too much for Mosebach, who in a recent essay writes that blasphemy should be punishable under German law. Mosebach is full of admiration for Muslim clerics who issue fatwas when a blogger or artist commit blasphemy:

 In diesem Zusammenhang will ich nicht verhehlen, dass ich unfähig bin, mich zu empören, wenn in ihrem Glauben beleidigte Muslime blasphemischen Künstlern – wenn wir sie einmal so nennen wollen – einen gewaltigen Schrecken einjagen. Ich begrüße es, wenn es in unserer Welt wieder Menschen wie Jean Jacques Rousseau gibt, für die Gott anwesend ist. Es wird das soziale Klima fördern, wenn Blasphemie wieder gefährlich wird.

(In this connection I must confess that I am unable to muster much outrage when Muslims whose faith has been insulted put a terrible fear in the hearts of blasphemous artists - if you can call them such.  I would be happy if there were more people today like Jean Jacques Rousseau who feel the presence of God.  Society would be much improved if blasphemy were dangerous again.)

Mosebach attempts to make a case under German law that blasphemy is unconstitutional, pointing out that the Preamble of the Grundgesetz (German Basic Law) makes specific reference to God:

Betrachtet man das Grundgesetz, so ist die Antwort einfach: Das Grundgesetz ist seiner Präambel nach „im Bewusstsein der Verantwortung vor Gott und den Menschen“ formuliert worden – die Frage, an welchen Gott die Väter und Mütter dieses Verfassungswerks gedacht haben mögen, ist ebenfalls leicht zu beantworten: Es war der Gott des Christentums, an einen anderen dürfte man Ende der 1940er Jahre schwerlich gedacht haben.

(The answer is simple if one just reads the Grundgesetz.  In the Peamble it clearly states that the drafters are "conscious of their responsibility before God and man." There can also be no doubt concerning to which God the mothers and fathers of the constitution were referring. It was the God of Christianity - it would have been difficult to conceive of any other at the end of the 1940s.) 

But the Grundgesetz also protects freedom of artistic expression.  And the Criminal Code of Germany (Strafgesetzbuch) explicitly deals with religious tolerance (Paragraph 166):

Any person who insults, publicly or by distribution of written material (§ 11 Abs. 3), the tenets of the religious or ideological denomination of other persons in such a way as to disturb the public peace is liable to punishment by imprisonment for up to three years or by a fine.

The key phrase is "disturb the public peace" ( den öffentlichen Frieden ... stören).  Germany today is a secular society, and people are not inclined to riot in the streets every time the pope is criticized or Jesus is mocked.

On the other hand, one could argue that Mosebach's beloved Church has violated Article 1 of the Grundgesetz in its systematic cover-up of massive child rape by priests and therefore deserves all the scorn it reaps today:

(1) Die Würde des Menschen ist unantastbar. Sie zu achten und zu schützen ist Verpflichtung aller staatlichen Gewalt.

((1) Human dignity shall be inviolable. To respect and protect it shall be the duty of all state authority)

Comments

[koogleschreiber]

Is there any example an organized religion has ever improved a society? Or did they, as Krishnamurti said, always fail?

[steve mark]

As per the Islamic teachings, Only Almighty Allah holds the right of punishment for blasphemy against the Prophet Muhammad (P.B.U.H). That is called Islamic Concept of Blasphemy.