OPINIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE FRENCH CGLPL
stipulated, notwithstanding the general principles laid down therein,
that the budgets of public corporations can be used to finance
“chaplaincy services” to guarantee “freedom of worship in public
institutions such as grammar schools, colleges, schools, old people’s
homes, asylums and prisons”.
2/ It follows that when people are no longer at liberty to come and
go as they please, the State should finance the cost of services the
necessary for “freedom of worship”. The term “public institutions”
used by the law should not be taken in its precise legal sense as
used today, but only in the sense of independent services controlled
exclusively by the authorities. Since the list contained in the 1905 Law
is not exhaustive, it should be taken as referring to any place in which,
beyond a reasonable period of time, people do not enjoy access to the
form of worship corresponding to their own religious denomination,
in cases where they belong to one, on account of their “isolation”.
As far as prisons are concerned establishments, the Code of Criminal
Procedure (Articles R. 57-9-3 sq.) has specifically laid down the
conditions governing access to worship. The same goes, to a lesser
degree, for hospitals (Articles L. 3211-3, 7 and R. 1112-46 of the Public
Health Code; see also circular n°DHOS/G/2005/57 of 2nd February
2005). In the case of detention centres, there are no legal requirements:
however, practices do exist in some cases, and are successful.
As far as secure educational centres are concerned, nothing
appears to have been defined, seemingly because no request has
been submitted. In any event, the obligations incumbent upon the
authorities responsible for these establishments are no different in
nature as regards their various types of occupants, other than in a
few ways.
3/ Based on the principles set out above, the authorities are not under
any obligation to:
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Accept as a chaplain any representatives of a de facto or
legally constituted body, the religious nature of which is not
established;
Accept a chaplain who has not agreed to abide by the
public order rules necessary to the running of a custodial
establishment;
Authorise forms of worship that cannot be reconciled with
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