There are now more than 40 reports by governmental and human rights bodies criticizing religious discrimination in Germany. The evidence has been persuasive enough to convince the U.S. State Department, the U.S. Trade Representative, the Commission for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Religious Intolerance, the Human Rights Centre of Essex University, England, and an ad hoc committee of British lords and scholars and many independent researchers.
Following a visit to Germany, in 1998 the United Nations Special Rapporteur issued a report in which he found that a climate of intolerance affected Mormons, Muslims, Scientologists, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Baha’is, and members of the Hare Krishna movement. Charismatic Christians have also been targeted.
The Church of Scientology has documented more than 1,500 cases of discrimination against its parishioners in Germany. The discrimination takes two main forms: a) requiring individuals to sign “filters” declaring in writing that they are not members of the Church of Scientology as a condition for employment or, if representing a company, for contractual relations, and b) harassment of Scientologists and attempted infiltration and dirty tricks against churches of Scientology by Germany’s so-called “Office for the Protection of the Constitution.”
The stigma attached to formalized discrimination of this type has created a climate of religious intolerance that breeds daily incidents of discrimination.
After the U.S. Trade Representative, who advises American companies on the security of their investments abroad, placed Germany on the “watch list” of countries engaged in discriminatory trade practices over its use of “filters”, the federal government relaxed the “filter” requirement. Nonetheless, the filters are still in widespread use against Scientologists in both the public and private sector throughout Germany.
The unfortunate fact remains that Scientologists in Germany are routinely dismissed and screened from public and private employment, screened from political parties, denied the right to contract with the government, denied the right to perform their art, denied the right to use public facilities and face boycotts and discrimination – solely due to their religious affiliation, and despite numerous German court rulings upholding their rights.
Germany’s discriminatory policies against religious minorities were put in place under Helmut Kohl. Nonetheless, the Schroeder administration has done nothing to remedy them or to prevent the momentum of discrimination from continuing to roll forward.
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