Freedom of faith can by no means be taken as a right. It should all the time be defended and taken care of. These had been the phrases of Dan Burton, IAPP Co-Chairman and US Congressman (1983-2013).
The clashes between authoritarian regimes and free societies are endangering individuals’s non secular freedom and human rights in every single place.
The 2nd Conference of Hope, held in South Korea on December 17, and live-streamed to thousands and thousands of viewers globally, concluded with a name for individuals worldwide to signal a Declaration in Support of Fundamental Human Rights and Human Dignity:
Conference of Hope Organizing Chairman Dr. Yun Young-ho opened the occasion by asking the viewers to do not forget that human rights “focus on the family, the God-centered family,” in addition to the person.
Overcoming Threats to Freedom of Thought, Conscience, and Religion. “We call upon all people throughout the world to affirm this declaration and to uphold the universal freedom of thought, conscience, and religion, and to stand firmly against all forms of intolerance, prejudice, slander, and hate toward others,” says the declaration.
“Religious freedom is “the human right to think and act upon what one deeply believes, according to the dictates of his or her moral conscience,” mentioned Bishop Don Meares, Senior Pastor of the Evangel Cathedral in Upper Marlboro, Maryland, US.
“Freedom of religion is freedom of thought and is an essential foundation of democracy, alongside the freedoms of speech and assembly,” mentioned Amb. Suzan Johnson Cook, Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom on the US State Department (2011-2013).
“No nation can exist without religion or human rights,” mentioned Hon. Nevers Mumba, Vice President of Zambia (2003-2004).
Speakers recounted stories of persecution of non secular teams—Muslim Uyghurs, Tibetan Buddhists, Jews, Christians, Muslims, Ahmadis, Bahais, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Yazidis, Rohingyas, Falun Gong, and, extra lately, the Family Federation of World Peace and Unification, previously the Unification Church, in Japan.
Regimes that veer towards totalitarianism see faith “as a dangerous competitor” and search to silence or management it, mentioned Doug Bandow, Senior Fellow on the Cato Institute, who makes a speciality of international coverage and civil liberty.
He cited a report from Open Doors, a corporation that tracks non secular persecution worldwide, highlighting the oppression carried out by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), Afghanistan’s Taliban, the North Korean regime, the Myanmar army junta, and governments in Eritrea, Cuba, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Laos.
The Chinese individuals’s protests towards the CCP and its “zero-COVID” insurance policies are the ”most widespread and fervent” the CCP has confronted since 1989, mentioned Hon. Mike Pompeo, US Secretary of State (2018-2021).
The world ought to help these protesters as a result of even when the CCP relaxes its COVID insurance policies, it “will continue to use its tools of oppression to crush religious freedom,” he mentioned, citing the continuing struggling of thousands and thousands of Muslim Uyghurs in Xinjang and persecution of 100 million Chinese Christians, each Catholics, and Protestants.
China can also be policing its individuals with mobile phone monitoring units, facial-recognition know-how, and digital digital foreign money that the state can management, mentioned Amb. Sam Brownback, US Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom (2018-2021).
“If they’re coming after every one of faith in China, and expanding these technologies to countries around the world, we’re going to soon be confronting this in a much larger sphere,” he mentioned, urging nations to face as much as China, politically and ideologically.
China opposes—and fears—Korean unification as a result of it believes a unified Korea would “align with the United States” and “slow down—or even block—China’s long-term 100-year strategy” to be the world’s international superpower, mentioned Dr. Michael Pillsbury, Director of the Center on Chinese Strategy on the Hudson Institute.
The CCP strictly controls each celebration members and church buildings on non secular issues, even because it pursues a five-year plan to rewrite the Bible, change Jesus’ acts, and remake Christianity to match the CCP’s imaginative and prescient, mentioned Dr. Pillsbury, writer of “The Hundred-Year Marathon: China’s Secret Strategy to Replace America as the Global Superpower,” the best-selling e-book about China’s formidable quest for hegemony.
In Japan, leaders within the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) as soon as welcomed the International Federation for Victory Over Communism (IFVOC), based by Rev. Sun Myung Moon, because it helped counter “the threats [to Japan] from North Korea and China,” mentioned Hon. Newt Gingrich, Speaker of the US House of Representatives (1995-1999).
Several audio system prompt that the CCP and its allies, such because the Japan Communist Party, try to take advantage of the tragic July 8 assassination of LDP chief former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Mr. Abe’s accused murderer is claimed to have held “a grudge” towards the Family Federation over donations his mom made to the church within the early 2000s.
The murderer’s alleged “grudge” has been utilized by the media and political officers to ignite public and legislative assaults on non secular donations on the whole, and the Unification Church particularly.
Mr. Abe “was the mastermind of Japan’s new, robust security and foreign policy, pushing for changes to the pacifist constitution, creating a defense force that can also be offensive, and forging alliances, like the Quadrilateral [Security] Dialogue with India, Australia, and the United States,” mentioned former BBC Correspondent Humphrey Hawksley, who has been monitoring the Abe assassination and aftermath.
But that apparent geopolitical agenda has not been raised in Japan’s media, and as a substitute, there was “a campaign” towards the Unification Church, Mr. Hawksley mentioned. In truth, one evaluation of 4,238 main Japanese media articles discovered that “not one gave a positive angle on the Unification Church,” he mentioned.