The Federal Court of Switzerland has said a law promoting an extreme form of ‘laicité’ in the Canton of Geneva is unconstitutional.

Aspects of the law are “contrary to religious freedom”, the country’s highest court said.

Back in 2018, when the norm was passed, the Reséau Evangelique Suisse (RES, the Swiss Evangelical Alliance in the French-speaking area) said aspects of the law were worrying: civil servants would not be allowed to show their faith affiliation “through words or external symbols”, and outdoor religious activities which had not received special authorisation, such as baptisms in rivers or lakes, a common practice among evangelical Christians in Switzerland, would be banned.

“Far from welcoming pluralism as something enriching for society”, the RES said in June 2018, the law “risks the creation of a climate of suspicion and exclusion towards religious communities”.

Now, the Evangelical Alliance welcomed a decision that is “a strong message of tolerance and respect for religious diversity”. It also underlined that it opposed a “militant and dogmatic secularism that wants to confine the religious reality to the private space”.