MOSTAR MOSTAR, Oct 17 (Hina) - Ninety-five percent of Bosnia-Herzegovina's population identifies with a religion, well-known Bosnian sociologist Ivan Cvitkovic has said at a public panel discussion entitled "The Role of the Church and
Religious Communities in the State and Society", held in the southern town of Mostar.
MOSTAR, Oct 17 (Hina) - Ninety-five percent of Bosnia-
Herzegovina's population identifies with a religion, well-known
Bosnian sociologist Ivan Cvitkovic has said at a public panel
discussion entitled "The Role of the Church and Religious
Communities in the State and Society", held in the southern town of
Mostar. #L#
According to Cvitkovic, universal religions - Islam and
Christianity - have turned into national religions in Bosnia.
"Religions appear as the leaders of national identities, and this
is a characteristic of Catholic, Orthodox and Islamic
fundamentalists," Cvitkovic said.
"If the state interferes in religion, the religious freedom
weakens, and if religion interferes in the state, the political
freedom weakens," he said and added that the marriage between
religion and state had not proven successful anywhere in the
world.
A professor of religion and expert in the Turkish immigration
community in Germany, Werner Shiffauer, said that after the
terrorist attack on the United States on September 11, 2001, the
connection between politics and fundamentalists of all religions
had increased. According to Shiffauer, everything today is in
question.
Commenting on processes in the Islamic world, Schiffauer said that
creative relations needed to be established between Islam and
politics.
(hina) it sb