Division of religious communities into traditional and non-traditional is established in the laws of Germany and Austria as well. However, according to representatives of these countries at the conference Religion and Right in a Civil Society, such division does not create a precondition for granting different legal status to different religious communities or for discriminating non-traditional ones. State recognition or traditionality of a religious community is not determined by the “age” of that community. In Lithuania though non-traditional communities may expect to be recognized by the state not earlier than 25 years after their initial registration. In Germany and Austria recognition is granted to a religious community on such criteria as the established doctrine, statutes, continuity of the activity, loyalty to the state, positive attitude towards democratic values. In Germany, for instance, Jehovan's Witnesses and The New Apostolic Church are among traditional religious communities.

Generally speaking, Europe has not managed to avoid establishment of discriminating statutory provisions with respect to religious minorities, though it has made a much greater progress promoting freedom of faith and religious tolerance than Lithuania. However important the aspect of traditionality and however rich the spiritual heritage might be, these criteria should not serve the basis for sorting and attaching certain value to faith chosen by any individual. When a state starts to classify its citizens according to their faith (religion) it inevitable gives rise to religious discrimination and intolerance.

The United States deserves to be called a symbol of freedom and democracy. It is a country where fundamental human rights and freedoms have gained almost an ideal status and are expressed in the best possible way both in the Constitution and in real life.

The Declaration of Independence adopted by the Congress of thirteen states on July 4, 1776, declares the following fundamental human rights:

Such statements have their origins in the Judaist-Christian perception of the human being and the world, which was the foundation of the American legal system. The right to practice a religion is not questioned but considered to be a self-evident right. Therefore, the Founding Fathers of the United States, the authors of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, did not thought themselves to be competent to regulate this right by laws or, even less so, to limit it in any way. For them one sentence was enough to define the relationship between the state and the religion practiced by its citizens:

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof” (an extract from Amendment 1 of the Constitution of the United States of America).

At the conference, referred in this article, the presentations of American participants demonstrated clearly the vast distance between the ambitious “democratic Europe”, proudly claiming that its political, cultural and religious traditions have the deepest roots, and the “free America”. In this respect, our “Catholic Lithuania” and the United States are worlds apart. We are not talking about geography or economic positions of the two countries but about the attitude towards the freedom of religion and its establishment in the American , European and Lithuanian systems. In the United States, there are over 3000 various religious communities and organizations and the federal authorities do not bother even to register them all. This fact alone shows that the state stands aside from the matters of its citizens' conscience and faith and respects this fundamental human right and freedom. The state does not classify religious communities into traditional and non-traditional, recognized and non-recognized and does not provide assistance to any of them. That is why no long and complicated explanations were made by the American speakers to show differences of legal status of different religious communities and to describe even more complicated and problematic consequences of such divisions.

On the one hand, one might think that absence of legal regulation of the state's relations with the religions practiced on its territory might have destructive consequences for the state and the public as this might open the door for really destructive cults. On the other hand though, destructive activity is persecuted under other laws applicable to every offender, regardless of the practiced religion or cult. Regrettably, such logic is acceptable only to the “American mentality”, while the Old Continent will hardly ever get rid of the witch-hunt syndrome, which nowadays shows itself in the widespread sect phobia.

Another paradox is that in America the Christianity is firmly established and influential though this country can not boast of having such deep Christianity roots as Europe or such a privileged position of the Catholicism as Lithuania. In America Christian values are evidenced not in architectural monuments or hills covered with crosses but by open statements of Presidents openly expressing and defending their religious views, prayers of the Judges of the Supreme Court before taking a decision and even the phrase “In God We Trust” on the dollar (which seems to be a least sacral thing). These are just a few examples describing the attitude of the Americans towards religion mentioned by the speaker form the United States. The examples show that this nation regards itself as an expression of God's will. For that reason, the politics and the religion are closely linked but this does not violate the basic principles of democracy. The speaker also mentioned that his country does not claim having a perfect system. Problems do occur but it is impossible to deny that the system functions smoothly establishing the principle of freedom and possibility for everyone to combine political and religious aspects of life.

Another speaker from the United States, who represented the Council of Experts on Issues of Religious Freedom under the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe and the International Religious Freedom Commission under the Federal Government of the United States, introduced to his listeners the international standards fostering religious freedom established in various human rights conventions, declarations and other documents. He placed particular emphasis on the principle of religious non-discrimination formulated in international norms and pointed out that “traditional religion” is a relative concept because a traditional thing or practice in one country may be totally unconventional in another. Therefore, people with different attitudes may not be discriminated on the grounds of tradition, and traditional religions should not restrict non-traditional ones or seek privileges for themselves.

Discussing the freedom of religion and seeking to define its status in Lithuania and in Western Europe we have to touch upon another freedom, which is also among the fundamental human rights, - the freedom of speech. In democratic states this freedom is considered the essential value. The freedom of speech is the foundation and the core of the mass media. It stands to reason that the means of mass media do not want to put up with any restrictions, which has set secular media means almost completely free from any internal censorship. Thanks to the power of free speech, the mass media has been titled “the fourth authority”.

So by what methods does this authority exercises its power and what principles it applies dealing with the issue of non-traditional religious communities or, as they are called now by religious experts, “new religiosity”. The conference provided useful information on this issue as one of the sessions was dedicated to the topic Mass Media and the New Religiosity: Impact on Public Politics, Social Response and Promotion of Religious Tolerance. The following is an extract from the presentation of Rūta Žiliukaitė, a representative of the Register of the Justice Ministry of the Republic of Lithuania:

We could add that such articles provoke not only “moral panic” but also religious intolerance, the breeding ground of which is the statutory provisions, and make members of non-traditional religious communities object of mockery and disrespect. Bearing in mind that, according to the statistics, about 80% of Lithuanians trust the mass media and having the data of the above analysis, one arrives at an evident conclusion that the majority of the public believe in statements about non-traditional religious communities which are, to put it mildly, far from truthful but are libelous and based on rumors.

I would like to provide an extract from a presentation made by Andrius Navickas, an employee of the Religious Studies and Research Center of Vilnius University:

Among the participants of the conference was professor Eileen Barker, a famous expert of the new religious movements. Speaking about the trends of the media, the professor made an interesting comment noting that the media has its own motives and pursues its goals. It consciously blows things out of proportion and searches for scandalous stories or details in order to attract the reader. So we are not supposed to expect objective, correct and explicit analysis of this issue.

It is characteristic of the media to speculate on such notions as “sect”, “cult”, “enticing”, “brain-washing” and the like. The word-combination ”destructive sect” is given without any explanations, simply to produce a desirable effect on the audience. Articles about new religious movements traditionally are constructed using the model of a criminal story, which must have victims, religious leaders, who, just like gangsters or mafia bosses, do their dirty work. By such methods the media consciously and persistently creates a distorted picture most often having very little resemblance to the reality. According to the professor, it is journalists themselves who do the “brain-wash”.

Within this context, let us read an extract from the Law on Informing the Public of the Republic of Lithuania: “Conducting their activity producers, distributors of public information and journalists shall act in compliance with the Constitution, laws, international agreements of which the Republic of Lithuanian is a party, the principles of humanity, equality, tolerance, respect for a person, they shall respect the freedom of speech, creativity, conscience, and variety of opinions, shall comply with the norms of the professional ethics of journalists, shall help to promote democracy, openness and civil responsibility of the society and development of the state, shall help to protect the independence of the state, promote national culture and morale. The means of mass media shall present public information in a truthful, correct and unbiased manner”.

The fourth authority neglects those principles with such an ease, as if they were addresses to someone else, and applies its own unwritten principles and motives, the consequences of which are far more destructive than the allegedly “destructive activity of sects thriving in Lithuania”. By mocking at the freedom of faith and conscience, disdaining the Christian values and instigating religious intolerance and hatred the mass media weakens the moral foundation of the state and, generally, the humanity.

To end this article with a more optimistic note, I would like to mention a recent positive trend in the media, the first example of which appeared in the biggest national daily Lietuvos Rytas (Lithuania's Morning) just before Christmas last year. An article in the issue of December 22 raised the following questions:

“Are the feelings of nonreligious persons protected in our society? Do not we insult our fellow countrymen by calling their communities sects? Even the churches of Methodists and Baptists with numerous members are called sects. In the civilized world the notion sect, which bears negative connotations, is used very cautiously.

All accusations addressed to sects must be thoroughly analyzed and where the suspicions turn out to be groundless the state should defend the right of the concerned people to express freely their religious views and practice their faith.