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Crib has to go, rules French court after atheists' complaint

A French court has stirred up a hornet's nest by ordering a regional government office to take down the Christmas crib it set up in its lobby as usual this Advent.

The western town of La Roche-sur-Yon, in the traditionally Catholic Vendée region, is appealing the order. Conservative politicians in other towns, especially those from the far-right National Front, have announced they will resist it.

The court acted after a complaint from the atheist Freethinkers Federation, which said the crib violated the 1905 laïcité law separating Church and state. A Federation official said the group pressed the issue in reaction to Catholic Church support for the mass demonstrations last year against the legalisation of same-sex marriage.

Jean Baubérot, a leading sociologist, said the case reflected a growing focus in recent years on enforcing laïcité that began as a restrictive secularism meant to limit Muslim demands. “Once an anti-Muslim mood sets in, it ricochets and produces a tougher line towards other religions,” he said.

In neighbouring Belgium, two women disguised as police dismantled the large Christmas crib on Brussels' main Grand-Place square in a protest against the Government's austerity polices. They symbolically beat the statues with sticks and expelled them from the crib, as if they were illegal immigrant squatters, and put up a banner reading “Screw the Poor”.

Bystanders watched as they went through their protest, until police came and led them away.

Above: The Christmas Nativity scene in Bethlehem