Beyond tolerance: re-centering religious freedom on the individual

I recently participated in an online webinar on religious freedom, peacebuilding, and civil society in the Middle East and North Africa.

Webinar participants came from Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Sudan, representing both Muslim and Christian communities. They were all engaged in civil society, advocating for human rights, for women’s rights, or peace and reconciliation.

Once the main presentation concluded and we moved to the Q&A session, I noticed something rather surprising. The panelists, organizers, and participants seemed to share an understanding of religious freedom as a right belonging to communities.

Communal rights allow groups to practice and express their beliefs collectively and protect them from violence and state repression. This perspective is incomplete.

The right to freedom of religion or belief primarily protects personal choice, conversion, and dissent.

[destacate]The right to freedom of religion or belief primarily protects personal choice, conversion, and dissent [/destacate]The webinar participants focused on threats to religious communities as a whole, whether from violence, terrorism, and radicalism (which is accurate and timely, given the ongoing situation in Syria) or from government manipulation and abuse of religion (which is also valid, as governments often seek legitimacy through religious affiliation).

However, the limitations on individual conversion, as well as blasphemy and apostasy laws, were not mentioned as threats. Additionally, communal violent reactions to individual religious conversion were overlooked.

A few years ago, a Christian leader from the Middle East shared with me that he was summoned by the authorities and questioned about the Open Doors World Watch List, an annual ranking of the 50 countries where Christian persecution is extreme.

“Why does our country rank so poorly on this list?” he was angrily asked. “Are you not satisfied? Did we not provide you with all the spaces you needed to worship?” It was challenging for this leader to explain that the Open Doors list considers the prohibition against non-Christians changing their religion.

In many regions and nations, religious tolerance and religious freedom are understood as “communities to communities,” while human rights law requires “tolerance towards individuals from other faiths, including those from ‘our community’ who have changed their faith.”

[destacate]In the Bible, individuals are in the image of God. And communities have responsibilities to care for the weakest among them, the poor, the widow, the orphan, and the foreigner[/destacate]In the Bible, individuals are in the image of God. And communities have responsibilities to care for the weakest among them, the poor, the widow, the orphan, and the foreigner.

Across the Middle East and North Africa, and in most regions of our world, much effort is needed to re-center the right to freedom of religion around the individual. Communities matter, but only when individuals are free can communities truly flourish.

In July at the Baptist World Alliance Congress in Brisbane, Baptist leaders from a dozen nations asked 21Wilberforce for support for initiatives on educating, first our Christian communities, and second, wider society, on the right to freedom of religion. If you are interested in helping us advance these opportunities, please reach out to me here.

Wissam al-Saliby, President of 21Wilberforce. He previously worked as Director of the World Evangelical Alliance United Nations Office in Geneva. This article was first published on the site of 21Wilberforce and re-published with permission.