For seven years the Albertin-Lautsi family has been fighting against the compulsory presence of crucifixes in the state schools attended by their sons. They complained to the school board, the administrative court, the council of state and finally the constitutional court - all to no avail.

This week they finally got satisfaction from the European court in Strasbourg. The presence of religious symbols in schools, the court said, "is in violation of the freedom of the parents to raise their children according to their own convictions". It is also a violation of the child's freedom of religion, the court said.

Tradition, not religion

"The ruling shows that the Italian state is anything but secular," said Soile Lautsi, a Finnish woman who has lived in Italy since 1987. "It shows that Italy is not in Europe but inside the walls of Vatican city," her Italian husband Massimo Albertin added in the daily newspaper Corriere della Sera.

But the European verdict has been condemned in Italy with the kind of unanimity you usually see only when Italian soldiers are killed abroad or when the national football team is victorious. All the major political parties have rallied behind the cross, which they say is not much a religious symbol as a symbol of Italian tradition, culture and history, they say.

The Italian government said the ruling was "an attack on our country's identity", and has announced that it will appeal. Education minister Mariastella Gelmini said: "Nobody wants to impose the Catholic religion on anyone, but nobody - not even a prejudiced European court - will succeed in erasing our identity."

Mussolini

The compulsory presence of the crucifix in Italian classrooms is an inheritance from the fascist regime. The Mussolini government adopted two decrees to that effect in 1924 and 1928. It also reached an agreement with the Vatican, the so-called Concordate from 1929, which led to the Vatican's first recognition of the Italian state, which fifty years earlier had taken away the pope's secular powers.

Under the Concordate billions of euros still go from the Italian state to the Vatican each year, and the episcopal conference still appoints the religion teachers to Italy's public schools. This generosity is due in part to the Catholic church' influence on Catholic voters in Italy. So with regional elections coming up it is no surprise that Italian politicians are falling over themselves to defend the cross.

A Vatican spokesperson said the European verdict is "short-sighted". "How can a European institution interfere to such an extent with the culture and traditions of a country," he asked. "It is as if the court wants to deny the central role Christianity has played in European culture." The Vatican said it expects the verdict to have a negative impact on the way Italians feel about Europe.