A new front in his battle to defend Italy's "cultural roots". Giorgia Meloni's Fratelli d'Italia (Brothers of Italy in English, or FdI) party tabled a bill in the Senate on Wednesday 20 December aimed at punishing schools that abandon Christmas nativity scenes.
The text explains that public schools cannot prevent parents, students or school bodies from promoting activities such as the installation of nativity scenes, plays and other events related to Christmas and Easter celebrations, reports the Milanese daily Corriere della Sera.
This initiative, according to Senator Lavinia Mennuni, who initiated the text, is a response to the "absolutely unacceptable" decision of some schools to rename Christmas as "Winter Festival". If the bill is passed, she assured that there will be nothing compulsory, but that "it will be forbidden to ban" these important Catholic traditions in Italy. Recalcitrant heads of schools would then be subject to disciplinary measures.
"Weapons of Distraction"
Opposition parties immediately denounced the proposal as yet another attempt by far-right leader Giorgia Meloni's party to instrumentalize religion for political purposes. "Christmas is approaching and the usual proposals of the right to safeguard 'Italian Christian traditions' are back," Riccardo Magi, secretary of the left-wing Più Europa (More Europe) party, posted on X.
Arriva il Natale e tornano le solite proposte della destra per salvaguardare le "tradizioni cristiane italiane". L'ultima trovata del partito di Meloni è un disegno di legge che renderà impossibile cancellare il presepe, il Natale e la Pasqua dagli istituti scolastici italiani di... pic.twitter.com/Vw67tMHugS
— Riccardo Magi (@riccardomagi) December 20, 2023
"They are ridiculous, they want to ban by law everything they don't like," said Luana Zanella, leader of the Alleanza Verdi e Sinistra (Alliance of Greens and the Left) group in the hemicycle, as quoted by the Italian daily La Stampa. "Instead of governing the country, a task they don't know how to handle, they continue to use 'distraction weapons'."
It was mainly the school community that was up in arms against FdI's proposal. "It is important to respect the traditions of the country, but imposing them by law is not the solution," said Antonello Giannelli, national president of the Association of School Directors (ANP). The principals of some multi-ethnic schools scattered across the country also denounced the move, calling it a "provocation", a "hoax", an "anachronistic imposition" or, at the very least, a "misplaced initiative", reports the Italian daily Il Sole 24.
Giorgia Meloni's posture, a "reiteration of belonging"
The proposed law on nurseries is the latest move by the Meloni government to promote conservative values in Italy. Since coming to power in October 2022, his government has taken steps to defend the traditional family, protect national identity, preserve cultural heritage, and limit immigration. The Italian executive has also made it more difficult for same-sex couples to register their children in the civil registry. The measure was condemned by the European Parliament, which described it as discriminatory.
Read also"Ghost parent": in Italy, Giorgia Meloni's crusade against same-sex families
During her election campaign, Giorgia Melona had made the Catholic religion a central element of her political discourse: "I am Giorgia, I am a woman, I am a mother, I am Italian, I am Christian," she told her supporters.
According to Ludmila Acone, a doctor of history specializing in medieval and contemporary Italy, Giorgia Meloni's position "is a reiteration of belonging that opposes foreigners, and especially Muslims. It's a political offensive that is very clearly anti-immigrant, anti-Muslim and identity-based." This stance is in line with the policy of the far-right Northern League party led by Matteo Salvini, current vice-president of the Council of Ministers.
The latter, who has turned religious symbols into a political tool, has been railing for nearly a decade against schools that try to turn Christmas into a more inclusive "Winter Festival". In May 2019, the leader of the League even drew the wrath of the Italian Church and the Vatican by brandishing the Gospel and his rosary during a speech.
"These postures are reminiscent of those of American evangelicals," says Ludmila Acone. "They are not the order of the day in Italy. If this political use of religion does not please the Vatican, it is because it is a fighting Christianity, in other words a neo-Christian offensive."
The pope, "much more open" than Fratelli d'Italia
By making the nativity scene its hobbyhorse, Fratelli d'Italia has not invented anything. In 2018, Education Minister Marco Bussetti criticised the principal of a school in Mestre for refusing to set up a crèche in the school's entrance hall. In the same year, the president of the provincial government of Trentino, Maurizio Fugatti, also called for the installation of a crèche in the classrooms. This proposal had been made as a result of the Northern League's proposal to make the crucifix compulsory on the walls of all public places. A proposal that has since fallen into oblivion.
The political offensive pursued by the Meloni government is also a manifestation of the deep divide that exists in Italy between two Catholic tendencies: one conservative and the other more liberal. "The conservative, even reactionary, tendency represented by Fratelli d'Italia considers that Catholic morality must be reaffirmed and wishes to promote it in all areas of society, including education," says Ludmila Acone. "The pope himself is much more open."
For Fratelli d'Italia, safeguarding the Catholic religion also requires the repression of other faiths. Last summer, the far-right party introduced a bill to ban Muslim prayer spaces outside mosques and ban the conversion of industrial garages and warehouses into places of worship.
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