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The Church-State relationships in EU Member States are in a process of a radical transformation. This is the result of a rapid political integration and also of the major transformations of the modernity. Religion is still part of the European public space even if, according to modernity premises, it should be only a private matter. According to Max Weber and other authors, secularization diminishes the role of the religion in society. However, these theories are being contested in recent years, due to the interpretation of statistical data and to the emergence of fundamentalist religious movements spreading around the world. Consequently, secularization is a tendency and not an "iron law". As regards the current role of the religion, Silvio Ferrari developed the theory according to which there is a common European model. This model does not exist yet, but certainly we live in an era defined by the continuous searching of such a model. There is no European identity without common values. Some of these values, like toleration, do have a profound religious foundation. European integration is based on the action of different actors, including interest groups located in Brussels. The Churches and the religious organizations are also part of this category of actors and they try to be part of a process by which a common space for consultation will emerge.

Any reflection on the relationship between religion and politics in the Catholic thought cannot do without reminding the Augustinian distinction between the civitas Dei and civitas terrena. The goal and foundation of any just political community should be the orientation to wards the common good. In the contemporary catholic thought, Johann Baptist Metz proposes a political theology revolving around the concepts of the value of the human person, the necessary refusal, on the part of the Church, of any mundane ideology and the necessary use of the socially critical potential of theological thought. Hans Küng criticizes any politicization of theology. He insists on the development of an internal pluralism within the Church and advocates a self-limitation of the magisterial intervention in the world in the name of a necessary "eschato logical reserve". Joseph Ratzinger/Pope Benedict the XVIth , invested with the magisterial authority, relies heavily on official documents of the Catholic social doctrine. He emphasizes the necessity of founding the state on the central value of justice and its acting according to the principle of subsidiarity. In this context, the Christian faith and the Church in particular may have a pedagogical role, as it may guide reason to follow the right priorities. All three thinkers agree on the public significance of the Christian vision of society and on the fact that it may help society both by its critical and by its constructive dimension.

Pierre Manent is viewed as a French thinker that develops in modern times the liberal tradition of political thinking. One of the most important issues of Manent's thinking that was not enough underlined it is the relationship between religion an politics and how this evolved from the beginning of Christianity until the main consequences of modernity. Manent view on religion and politics is the core of this paper analysis. The main contributions of Manent, such as Naissances de la politique moderne. Machiavel, Hobbes, Rousseau (1977), Histoire intellectuelle du lib.ralisme (1987) La cit. de l'homme (1994), Cours familier de philosophie politique (2001), La raison des nations. R.flections sur la d.mocratie en Europe (2006) are analyzed from this perspective. Our conclusion is that in the way Manent deals with the relationship between politics and religion there are some constants that may be found in all his work. These are: the relationship between the Church and the different forms of political organization in Europe (Civitas, Imperium, monarchy); the fact that Christianity is one of the few current relevant concepts for political, due to the failure of totalitarian ideologies; the idea that secularization in Europe is not irreversible; we live in "an age of separations", and Church-State is one of these separations; we witness the religion transformation process and the .tat la.que cannot survive to .tat-nation; the role of Islam in modern societies and his perpetual finding of a political form; the relationship between Judaism, state and nation; the issue of the Christian identity of Europe.

This article intends to analyze the role of religion in the public sphere in Habermas's theory. Despite the fact that the concept has been launched in a book published in 1961, only in 2005 the well-known German thinker has dealt explicitly with this issue. Even the critics of his public sphere model do not mention the lack of religion from the whole paradigm. Some of Habermas writings related to religion prior to 2005 are discussed. The role of religion in the public sphere is, according to Habermas, related with the issue of religious freedom and the State- Church separation, a model opposed to French laicïté. For Habermas, the state must not only be neutral to the religious discourse, but it must also encourage the participation of political organizations to public life. Another issue that is discussed by Habermas is the relationship between religious majorities and minorities. Habermas does assume a middle position between laicïté and the refuse of the modernity-imposed borders between religion and politics. The article takes an insight into the way Charles Taylor deals with the role of religion in the public sphere, a helpful argument for showing that the debate on this issue is only at the beginning.

Bu çalışmada, "DP'nin Yükselme Devri" olarak adlandırılan 1950-54 dönemi din siyaseti incelenmektedir. Çalışmanın DP'nin tüm iktidar dönemini değil de, anılan dönemi ele alması, çalışmayı sınırlandırma kaygısından kaynaklanmaktadır. Böylece dar bir dönem ele alınarak, daha derinlemesine inceleme yapılması amaçlanmaktadır. İnceleme konusu olarak anılan dönemin seçilmesinin nedeni, çok partili siyasal yaşamla birlikte Türkiye'de din siyasetinde meydana gelen değişikliği anlama çabasıdır. Bu amaçla önce kısaca çok partili siyasal yaşama geçilmesiyle birlikte CHP'nin din siyasetinde meydana gelen değişikliklere değinilmekte; daha sonra DP'nin din siyaseti ele alınmaktadır. İnceleme yapılırken DP'nin anılan dönemde uygulamaya koyduğu düzenlemeler ayrıntılı bir biçimde irdelenmektedir. Bu özelliğinden dolayı çalışmanın bir vaka incelemesi (case study) olduğu söylenebilir. Sonuç olarak, tek parti dönemi din siyasetinin (militan laiklik), çok partili yaşama geçişle birlikte CHP ile değişmeye başladığı; DP'nin ise söz konusu din siyasetini daha ödüncü bir biçimde sürdürdüğü; ancak özünde CHP'nin din siyasetine bağlı kaldığı söylenebilir. ; This study exarnines the policies towards religion in the first four years of the Demoeratic Party's role between 1950 and 1954. This period will be considered both because of methodological reasons to do a detailed studyand because of the importance of the time period as the first years of the multiparty politics inTurkey. The paper attemts to analyze the changes in the parties' policies toward religion after the transition to multiparty politics. First, the policy of the Republican Peeple' s Party towards religion is analyzed in short and then the Demoeratic Party's policyand practices towards religion are studied in detai!. The Democratic Party' s practices in the issue area of religion are taken into account when evaiuating its policy towards religion. The study aims to be a case study. The changes in the one party regime's attitude towards religion had first been initiated by the ...