Discussions by religious leaders over how conversion between faiths should be promoted must remember the rights of all individuals to select and follow the beliefs their conscience dictates, Seventh-day Adventist religious liberty leaders say.
Discussions by religious leaders over how conversion between faiths should be promoted must remember the rights of all individuals to select and follow the beliefs their conscience dictates, Seventh-day Adventist religious liberty leaders say.
The Vatican and the World Council of Churches, or WCC this week launched a three-year joint study project aimed at developing a shared code of conduct on the controversial issue of religious conversion, according to a WCC statement. The project, “Interreligious reflection on conversion: from controversy to a shared code of conduct,” began with a meeting in Velletri, Rome, from May 12 to16, the WCC said. Some 30 participants representing different religious traditions and regions, met to assess “the current reality of religious conversion from an interreligious point of view.”
“The issue of religious conversion remains a controversial dimension in many interconfessional and interreligious relations,” said Rev. Dr. Hans Ucko, head of the WCC’s interreligious relations office, in a statement released by the group. “We hope that at the end of this study project, we will be able to propose a code of conduct that will affirm that commitment to our faith never translates into denigration of the other,” he added.
The Seventh-day Adventist Church is not a WCC member, but has sent observers to the organization’s meetings. Dr. John Graz, director of public affairs and religious liberty for the church, says Adventists will follow the work of the WCC-Vatican panel “with interest.”
Graz said, “We also hope that the concept of religious freedom won’t be neutralized by a consensus between religious majorities. The key issue will be ‘proselytism.’ It won’t be difficult to imagine that a common rejection of proselytism [would] be one of the first results of that commission.”
The promotion of religious choice by individuals is an inherent part of international understanding. Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, passed by the United Nations in 1948, declares that “everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching practice, worship and observance.”
Those provisions—the freedom to change belief, as well as to “manifest” it in “teaching practice”—could come under fire if proselytism restrictions result from the WCC-Vatican talks, says Dr. Jonathan Gallagher, who represents the Adventist world church at the United Nations.
“To deny the right to change one’s religion is a violation of a fundamental human right,” Gallagher told ANN. “A number of countries have passed laws to deny this right, or to severely limit it. Most recently, Algeria passed legislation that criminalizes anyone trying to convert a Muslim believer, with the penalty up to five years in prison. Similar laws have been passed in some states of India, in Iran and Mauritania, and are under consideration in Sri Lanka.
Gallagher adds, “At the United Nations we have presented numerous statements condemning the imposition of the death penalty for conversion, and have repeatedly urged the UN in its resolutions on religious intolerance to specifically reject such extreme human rights violations. The right to choose to change one’s religion or belief must be safeguarded, and anti-conversion laws or policies must be opposed. They are an unwarranted intrusion into the sacred area of freedom of conscience.”
In 2000, the International Religious Liberty Association (IRLA) issued a call for the “responsible dissemination of religion or belief” by members of religious communities. A 25-member Board of Experts, convened in Spain under the group’s auspices and adopted a 14-point statement on the subject called “Guiding Principles”. The statement challenges religious communities around the world to recognize the “increasing reality of religious pluralism” and an urgent need to improve the way religious convictions are shared.
“In witnessing to others or in planning missionary activity, the inviolable dignity of the addressed persons requires consideration of their history, convictions, way of life and cultural expressions,” the document states.
The IRLA, a non-denominational organization first envisioned by the Seventh-day Adventist Church, has worked to promote religious liberty since 1893 and is active through its affiliates in more than 70 countries.