Intolerance & Discrimination Against the Scientology Community in Germany Today

SECTION I. GOVERNMENT SANCTIONED DISCRIMINATION

n recent years, state governments have taken a series of actions calculated to create an atmosphere of hatred against all Scientologists in Germany and to ostracize Scientologists by stripping them of their religious and civil rights. This religious apartheid has been proclaimed by government officials who intend, in the words of one of their number, to “make Germany clear of Scientology.”

Such oppression continues even though Scientology has been recognized as a religion by courts in Munich, Frankfurt, Berlin and Hamburg and despite opinions by religious scholars and legal experts disproving government accusations against new religions. The chilling words of one politician, Susan Eisenmann, member of the state parliament of Baden-Württemberg/ Stuttgart, have been echoed in parliaments throughout Germany: “We need an all-out social ostracism of the Scientology sect. This has not been achieved yet: the road to that goal is still far.”

The government has continued to seek legal ways to issue derogatory press releases or statements against the newer religions. In 1989, it brought the matter to the Federal Supreme Administrative Court in Berlin. The government argued that it had the right to issue public warnings against new religions from its “duty of care for the people” specifically regarding the “protection of health, family and youth.” The Supreme Administrative Court granted this legal argument and canceled all earlier contrary rulings that forbade the government to trespass into the religious field. By this ruling, the Supreme Court enormously weakened the constitutional principle of government neutrality in matters of religion.

Government Sanctioned Discrimination continued...