{"id":3390,"date":"2014-02-13T07:19:09","date_gmt":"2014-02-13T07:19:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/wp3\/?p=3390"},"modified":"2014-02-13T07:19:09","modified_gmt":"2014-02-13T07:19:09","slug":"islam-2nd-largest-religion-in-italy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sunnionline.us\/english\/2014\/02\/13\/3390\/","title":{"rendered":"Islam 2nd Largest Religion in Italy"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"images\/stories\/news3\/make-Islam-Official-Italian-Muslims.jpg\" border=\"0\" style=\"float: right; margin: 5px;\" \/>Members of the Italian Muslim community have come together to discuss problems facing the religious minority, highlighting Muslim contributions to the Italian economy and complaining about lack of official status for the second largest religious group in the country.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>  <!--more-->  <\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Figures from the national statistics agency \u201cIstat tell us that there are currently about 1,700,000 Muslims in Italy,\u201d said Izzedin Elzir, Florence imam and head of the Muslim umbrella group Unione delle Comunit\u00e0 e Organizzazioni Islamiche in Italia (UCOII), ANSA news agency reported on Tuesday, February 11.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">\u201cThere are over 700 mosques,\u201d Elzir added.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The Florence imam comments came during his meeting with other members of the Muslim community at the special conference for Muslims held on Tuesday in Rome,<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The conference was held at the Niccol\u00f2 Cusano University and was attended by leading members of the Italian Muslim community.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Speaking at the conference, Elzir referred to Muslims contributions in the Italian economy.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">\u201cMuslims account for 4-5% of national GDP. In other words,\u201d Elzir said.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">\u201cIslam constitutes added value for Italy.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>No Official Status<\/strong><\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Despite the &#8220;added value&#8221; the Muslim community brings to Italy, they have no official status, the imam added.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">\u201cDespite the fact that freedom of religion is enshrined in the Constitution, the absence of a resulting law had led to the Muslim community&#8217;s de facto not being recognized by the Italian State, with which there is no agreement\u201d, in the likes of those regulating relations between Italian institutions and religions other than Catholicism (with which relations were set down in the Concordat).<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Similar agreements were entered year ago with other minority religions, such as Judaism and Buddhism.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Agostino Cilardo, expert in Islamic law at the Naples Orientale University, shared a similar concern.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">\u201cThe problem of a lack of representation is a concrete one, not only an official one,\u201d noted Cilardo.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">\u201cWhen you draw up an agreement, the counterpart is a unified organization. But who can speak on behalf of Muslims in Italy,\u201d he said.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">The lack of official status means Muslims organizations are not eligible for funding through the Italian law that allows taxpayers to allocate part of their taxes to a religious group of their choice.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Efforts to recognize Islam in Italy, even unofficially, are often slammed by the separatist Northern League.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Plans by Italian Prime Minister Enrico Letta to establish a museum of Islamic art on the banks of the Grand Canal in Venice has also sparked angry reactions from separatist Northern League.<\/span><br \/><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Plans by regional councils to build more mosques have also been slammed.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"color: #000000;\">Source:<\/span> <em><strong>OnIslam<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Members of the Italian Muslim community have come together to discuss problems facing the religious minority, highlighting Muslim contributions to the Italian economy and complaining about lack of official status for the second largest religious group in the country.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3390","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-c102-muslim-minorities"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.6 - 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