The Convention of January 2015

The Luxembourgish Government signed an Agreement with the religious communities in January 2015, establishing a new legal framework regulating their relationship. The new system will be in force after the future constitutional reform, the requirement for which is a two/third majority vote of the MPs. This process is not yet completed.

The preamble Agreement stipulates the respect of the human rights framework and its applications in all fields of the religious communities’ social and educational activation. Article 2 of the Agreement underlines that freedom of worship is guaranteed within the constitutional context. The religious communities should exclude any member from their own institutions, in the case of violating the state law. Article 3 stipulates the autonomy of internal organization and its freedom in recruiting personnel.

Under the new legal framework, the ministers of each cult (including for the first time, the Mufti and the Imams) will be subject to the private sector labour law, instead of being civil servants paid directly by the State treasury. After the implementation of the new agreement, the religious communities will receive State subsidies for covering the minister’s salary payment and their social security. The religious communities will be responsible for defining the wages of this category of employees, as well as the number of working positions. The Churches, being the employers of the religious ministers, have the option to use communal revenues, as a bonus payment in addition to the base salary provided by the State. The retirement age for all ministers will be sixty-five (articles 4-6).