To Americans who drop coins into the collection plate, write a check or perhaps text in their Sunday donation, the idea that the state would charge an annual tax to support their church can seem strange and off-putting indeed.

But in several Western European countries, a majority of adults not only agree to pay a church tax imposed on all baptized Christians, but also have no intention of opting out of it, even though they can, according to a new survey by the Pew Research Center published on Tuesday (April 30).

That includes many who don’t attend church regularly but who still pay the tax.

From the outside, Western Europe is often seen as a highly secularized region where established religion is dying out. Church taxes are blamed for part of that erosion, because the only way to avoid the tax where it is mandatory is to officially leave the church one was baptized in.

But the Pew report, titled “In Western European Countries With Church Taxes, Support for the Tradition Remains Strong,” found far more people still finance their church than attend it.

Of the 15 countries it studied, Pew found six have mandatory taxes — Austria, Denmark, Fin-land, Germany, Sweden and Swi-tzerland — while Italy, Portugal and Spain have voluntary pro-grams and no church taxes are collected at all in Belgium, Britain, France, Ireland, the Netherlands and Norway.

Bishop Franz-Josef Bode, the Vice-President of the German Bishops, states in a new interview that he can “very well imagine that there are also priests with family and [civil] job, similar to our deacons, some of whom are married and have a job.” This model of married “priests with a civil job,” he predicts, will “probably be presented to the Pope by the Latin American bishops at the Amazon Synod in October.”

Speaking with the regional newspaper Osnabrücker Zeitung, Bishop Bode makes it clear that he is in favor of “rethinking the link between celibacy and the priesthood.”

“Priests with a civil job” could “celebrate the Eucharist” and also provide “the corresponding priestly services,” he says.

In Bishop Bode’s view, this model will “probably be present-ed to the Pope by the Latin American bishops at the Amazon Synod in October.” He explains that “the high and proper estimation of celibacy shall always be preserved, but it should be enriched by other priestly forms of life.” In that same interview, the German bishop also speaks in favor of female deacons “as a sign of recognition, esteem, and change of status of women in the Church who are today in large numbers active in charitable fields and in the field of the diaconate.”

Christians are the most persecuted of all religious groups in the world, according to a new report.

It is estimated that one third of the world’s population suffers from religious persecution in some form, with Christians being the most persecuted, according to the interim report of the independent review into Foreign and Commonwealth Office support for persecuted Christians worldwide.

The Anglican Bishop of Truro, the Right Rev Philip Mounstephen, asked by Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt to lead the review, said he was “truly shocked by the severity, scale and scope of the problem”.

The interim report says: “Despite the fact that the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is foundational to the UN Charter, which is binding on member states, and that ‘the denial of religious liberty is almost everywhere viewed as morally and legally invalid’, in today’s world religious freedom is far from being an existential reality.”

The full report is due to be presented to Mr Hunt by the end of June, and will make recommendations for changes in both policy and practice.

The scale of the problem was demonstrated by the fact that the report was out of date by the time it was published, most notably because of the Easter Sunday bombings in Sri Lanka.

The key research findings drawn together by the review include some from the Pew Research Centre which found that in 2016 Christians were targeted in 144 countries, a rise from 125 in 2015, and concluded: “Christians have been harassed in more countries than any other religious group and have suffered harassment in many of the heavily Muslim countries of the Middle East and North Africa.”

The charity Open Doors also revealed in its World Watch List that “approximately 245 million Christians living in the top 50 countries suffer high levels of persecution or worse”, 30 million up on the previous year.

According to Persecution Relief, 736 attacks were recorded in India in 2017, up from 348 in 2016. With reports in China showing an upsurge of persecution against Christians between 2014 and 2016, government authorities in Zheijiang Province targeted up to 2,000 churches, which were either partially or completely destroyed or had their crosses removed.

President Emmanuel Macron has vowed to rebuild Notre-Dame “even more beautifully” within five years, as all of France’s cathedrals prepared to ring their bells on Wednesday to mark 48 hours since the colossal fire began.

The blaze on 15th April gutted the great Paris landmark, destroying the roof, causing the steeple to collapse and leaving France reeling with shock.

Macron announced the fast timescale for restoration — a process some experts said would take decades — in an address to the nation where he hailed how the disaster had shown the capacity of France to mobilise and unite. Pledges worth around 700 million euros ($790 million) have already been made from French billionaires and businesses to restore the Gothic masterpiece.

An unknown number of artefacts and paintings have been lost and the main organ, which had close to 8,000 pipes, has also suffered damage. But the cathedral’s walls, bell towers and the most famous circular stained-glass windows at France’s most vi-sited tourist attraction remain intact.

Macron’s defiant comm-ents indicated he wants the reconstruction of the cathedral to be completed by the time Paris hosts the Olympic Games in 2024.

“We will rebuild the cathedral even more beautifully and I want it to be finished within five years,” Macron said from the Elysee Palace. “And we can do it.”

Macron said that the dramatic fire had brought out the best in a country driven by divisions and since last November shaken by some-times violent protests against his rule.

“Our history never stops and that we will always have trials to overcome,” he added. The bells of all cathedrals in France will sound at 6:50 pm (1650 GMT) on Wednesday, 48 hours after the fire started.

A number of Arab nations and Al- Azhar Islamic institution in Cairo condemned the Easter Sunday bombings in Sri Lanka that killed more than 350 people. Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates issued statements on April 21 via their foreign ministries over the attack.

The UAE called upon “the international community to close ranks and uproot the scourge of terrorism in order to ensure international peace and security.”

Bahrain said “these acts of terrorism are incompatible with religious principles and human and moral values.”

Saudi Arabia also denounced the “terrorist explosions” and extended the kingdom’s condolences to the families of the victims and the people of Sri Lanka.

The series of blasts at three churches and three luxury hotels killed at least 350 people. It is the worst spout of violence in Sri Lanka since the South Asian country’s bloody civil war ended a decade ago.

In Cairo, Al-Azhar, the Sunni Muslim world’s foremost religious institution, also condemned the “terrorist” attacks.

“I cannot imagine a human being could target the peaceful on their celebration day,” said Sheikh Ahmed al-Tayeb, the institution’s grand imam.

“Those terrorists’ perverted disposition goes against the teachings of all religions,” he said in comments published on Al-Azhar’s Twitter account.

“I pray that God may grant patience to the families of the casualties and recovery to the injured,” added Sheikh Tayeb.

Al-Azhar frequently denounces jihadist movements and regularly reaches out to the Christian faith.

Two Muslim groups in Sri Lanka and the secretary general of the world’s largest organisation of Muslim nations also issued statements condemning the attacks.

The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation’s chief Yousef al-Othaimeen described them as “cowardly attacks” that targeted innocent worshippers and civilians. Some 57 nations are part of the OIC, which is headquartered in Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea city of Jeddah.