The European Court of Human Rights held that Greece’s system of exemptions of children from compulsory religious education classes in public schools violates freedom of education provisions and freedom of thought conscience and religion protected by the European Convention on Human Rights and Protocol Number 1 to the Convention.
In order to withdraw a child from otherwise compulsory religious education parents had to declare that their children didn’t belong to Orthodox Christianity (read here the previous article about the judgement of national Greek courts). The Strasbourg-based court now said this requirement places an undue burden on parents to reveal information from which it can be inferred that they and their children adhere, or do not adhere, to a specific religious dogma.
Read more about it here or access the court’s press release here.
