A controversy in Germany a couple of years ago about Islamic content on tax-funded websites has faded and broadcasters are now gingerly wondering if Islamic spirituality should be permitted on German radio. It is hard to imagine a more cautious start to presenting Islamic faith on the staid airwaves of German public broadcasting.
To listen to the mini-sermons, which were launched in 2007, listeners must visit a website and download the audio or video files on Islamic topics, because they are not carried on radio or TV at all. The five-minute podcasts by the Suedwestrundfunk (SWR) broadcasting corporation are issued once per month and contain non-controversial spiritual guidance from a panel of four Muslim authors, all of whom are graduates of German universities.
They write the texts, which are edited by broadcasting staff and then read aloud by professional German announcers. Anodyne as the talks are, the SWR corporation says they are being downloaded up to 50,000 times monthly. The only other content aimed at Muslims on German public broadcasting, ZDFnational television's Forum on Friday, also began in 2007.
It comprises video interviews by ZDF journalists with a wide variety of Islamic intellectuals talking in German about issues including political Islam. The ZDFseries generally takes a hostile stance towards religious conservatives. The 10-minute ZDFvideo clips are not broadcast, but have to be viewed on the ZDFwebsite, just as the SWR podcasts are. Both SWR and ZDFare funded by a tax on all TVsets and personal computers.
Back in 2007, many Germans saw red about the plans to spend "their" money on what were dubbed "Friday prayers" on SWR, a family of radio and TV stations in the Stuttgart area. SWR's political masters intervened, demanding caution. Muslims make up 5 per cent of Germany's population, new figures show. At a seminar in June which reviewed the podcasts service, editorial staff admitted they were still treading very carefully.
The seminar was hosted by the Catholic bishop of Stuttgart, Gebhard Fuerst. His endorsement of the podcasts may partly reflect recent suggestions from high Vatican officials that the Catholic Church and Islam share an interest in resisting the rise of atheism and defending the rights of religious communities. Bishop Fuerst obliquely criticised the German authorities for choosing the authors of the Islamic talks.
The Christian churches largely have the freedom to choose their own speakers for similar weekly talks on public radio. He said SWR should study whether Muslims actually like the podcasts. "There are practically no qualitative assessments of what listeners think about them," he said. That meant it was open to question whether the talks were in tune with what most of the 4 million Muslims thought. Despite the criticism, academics at the seminar agreed it was a good thing that SWR had taken the first step.