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Ilia the Second – “Procedures of Granting Status of Public Law Legal Entity to Some Religious Unities Must Stop”

July 5, 2011

Patriarch of Georgia, his holiness and beatitude Ilia the Second believes it is necessary to stop procedures of granting status of public law legal entity to some religious unions in Georgia.

The Patriarch made a special statement which was announced by Father Giorgi Zviadadze yesterday evening.

“We believe it is necessary to stop procedures of adopting law –second and third hearings of the draft-law; we think public debates shall be held on the issue; at least live TV debates, in order to estimate common public opinion and achieve consensus with Orthodox Church, as majority of the country’s population are Orthodox Christians. We kindly remind our citizens that the issue is of utmost importance, as it determines main principles of state regulations”, the patriarch’s statement reads.

According to the statement, completely unexpectedly to the Church and the entire population, the Parliament of Georgia adopted law at the first hearing on 1 July about granting status of public law legal entity to some religious organizations. The statement says that the status of the Orthodox Church and Concordat have been topic of discussion for many years and international expertise was carried out on it too.

“Church has never been against and always supported idea to grant status to other religious organizations in Georgia and to protect their rights, but the process did not have any continuation and the government did not set up state commission to study the issue”, the patriarch’s statement reads.

The statement notes that neither issues of taking care of Georgian temples in other countries nor status of Georgian churches in foreign countries has been raised yet.

The Parliament initiated a bill, according to which, the religious entities that have “close historical ties with Georgia, namely Romanian Catholic Church, Armenian Apostolic Church, Muslim Community, Judaist Community and Evangelical-Baptist Church of Georgia will have status of public law legal entity.”

The bill was initiated by MPs Lasha Tordia, Chiora Taktakishvili and Nugzar Tsiklauri.

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