The use and choice of languages in the different religions often follows other criteria than in the institutions of the state. In the Republic, French is the only official language, whereas in religious celebrations there are linguistic situations marked by a surprising diversity. This diversity is not limited to the co-presence of "vulgar language" and "sacred language". On the one hand, sacred or traditional languages, such as Latin in Catholicism, ancient Greek or Church Slavonic in Christian Orthodoxy, High Arabic in Islam or Hebrew in Judaism still play specific roles either in the texts or in the liturgical rites. On the other hand, immigration has enriched the religious landscape of France, and it is often in religious communities that immigrants and their descendants gather. Belonging to a religious community is often part of the constitution or affirmation of specific cultural identities in a plural society. Within Islam, Christianity (Protestants, Catholics and Orthodox) and Judaism there are hundreds of allophone communities. In the Catholic diocese of Paris alone, for example, there are about twenty church communities of "foreign origin".
The aim of our conference will be first to draw up an initial assessment of the linguistic diversity within religious communities in France and then to study the motivations behind the choice of an immigrant language. Under what conditions do the various religious communities abandon their language of origin in favour of French? What is the place of the different languages within religious worship, what is the linguistic usage during secular meetings of believers? Finally, we will take a closer look at the perception of this kind of linguistic diversity in the debates, especially around 'communitarianism'.