https://youtube.com/watch?v=OpDS30a8uo8
Speaking via a translator, Gérard Biard, the new editor of French humor magazine Charlie Hebdo, responded to Pope Francis’s controversial comments about the relationship between free speech and religious faith on Sunday’s Meet the Press.
“Every time that we draw a cartoon of Muhammad, every time that we draw a cartoon of the Prophet, every time that we draw a cartoon of God, we defend the freedom of religion,” said Biard. “We declare that God must not be a political or public figure. He must be a private figure. We defend the freedom of religion. Yes, it is also the freedom of speech, but it is the freedom of religion.”
“Religion,” Biard continued, “should not be a political argument. If faith, if religious argument, steps into the political arena, it becomes a totalitarian argument. Secularism protects us against this. Secularism guarantees democracy and ensures peace. Secularism allows all believers and all non-believers to live in peace, and that is what we defend.”
The interview comes not quite two weeks after Islamic extremists murdered ten journalists, including four of France’s most famous cartoonists, at the magazine’s Paris headquarters.