WFreedom of religion or religious liberty is a principle that supports the freedom of an individual or community, in public or private, to manifest religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship, and observance. It also includes the freedom to change one's religion or beliefs, "the right not to profess any religion or belief" or "not to practise a religion".
WThe 1930 Western Wall Commission, also Wailing Wall Commission, was a commission appointed by the British government, under their responsibilities in the Mandate for Palestine, in response to the 1929 Palestine riots. The commission was intended "to determine the rights and claims of Muslims and Jews in connection with the Western or Wailing Wall," and determine the causes of the violence and prevent it in the future. The League of Nations approved the commission on condition that the members were not British.
WThe 2001 About-Picard law [abu pika:r], is a controversial piece of French legislation, which broadly speaking, makes it possible to act against organisations when such organisations have become involved in certain crimes. The law is targeted at sects and movements deemed cultic that "undermine human rights and fundamental freedoms", as well as "mental manipulation". The law has caused controversy internationally, with some commentators alleging that it infringes on religious freedom while proponents contend that it reinforces religious freedom.
WThe Ahdname of Milodraž, also called the Ahdname of Fojnica, was the ahdname issued on 28 May 1463 by the Ottoman sultan Mehmed the Conqueror to Bosnian Franciscans, represented by Anđeo Zvizdović.
WThe Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs is an academic research center at Georgetown University in Washington, DC dedicated to the interdisciplinary study of religion, ethics, and politics. The center was founded in 2006 under a gift from William R. Berkley, a member of Georgetown's Board of Directors. The center's founding director was Thomas Banchoff.
WThe Bhagavad Gita As It Is trial in Russia was a trial that commenced in 2011 about banning the Russian edition of the book Bhagavad Gita As It Is (1968), a translation and commentary of the Hindu holy text Bhagavad Gita, on charges that the commentaries fomented religious extremism. It contains a translation and commentary by A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, founder of the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON), commonly known as the Hare Krishna movement.
WBibeltemplet is a Christian website in Sweden, whose administrator Leif Liljeström was sentenced in April 2005 to two months in prison for holding and expressing critical views on homosexuality. The case was appealed twice, and the Supreme Court of Sweden acquitted Liljeström in November 2007.
WThe Calcutta Quran Petition is a book by Sita Ram Goel and Chandmal Chopra published by Goel under his Voice of India imprint. The first edition was published in 1986, the second in 1987 and the third in 1999.
WThe Center for the Study of Democracy is a research and education institute at St. Mary's College of Maryland that focuses on the study of the history of emerging democracy in St. Mary's City, Maryland, the site of Maryland'a first colonial capital and the location of many firsts in the development of democratic rights in North America; this work is done in conjunction with studies of modern democracies.
WDissenter Acts were laws, enacted by the King of Sweden with the consent of the Swedish Parliament, which gave nonconformists who wanted to leave the then established Church of Sweden the right to do so, provided that the dissenters then joined one of the state-approved denominations. The first such edict was decreed in 1860 by Karl XV and the Ståndsriksdag; the second one in 1873 by Oscar II and the reorganized bicameral Riksdag. Neither the Ståndsriksdag, divided into four Estates, nor the newer Riksdag could be said to be truly democratic, though, as the suffrage was restricted to males who owned property. The 1873 edict remained in force until the 1951 Religious Freedom Act (religionsfrihetslag); the Church of Sweden remained the established state church until 2000.
WThe Edict of Milan was the February AD 313 agreement to treat Christians benevolently within the Roman Empire. Western Roman Emperor Constantine I and Emperor Licinius, who controlled the Balkans, met in Mediolanum and, among other things, agreed to change policies towards Christians following the Edict of Toleration issued by Emperor Galerius two years earlier in Serdica. The Edict of Milan gave Christianity legal status and a reprieve from persecution but did not make it the state church of the Roman Empire. That occurred in AD 380 with the Edict of Thessalonica.
WThe Flushing Remonstrance was a 1657 petition to Director-General of New Netherland Peter Stuyvesant, in which some thirty residents of the small settlement at Flushing requested an exemption to his ban on Quaker worship. It is considered a precursor to the United States Constitution's provision on freedom of religion in the Bill of Rights. According to Kenneth T. Jackson, the Flushing Remonstrance was remarkable for four reasons:it articulated a fundamental right that is as basic to American freedom as any other, the authors backed up their words with actions by sending it to an official not known for tolerance, they stood up for others in articulating a principle that was of little discernible benefit to themselves, and the language of the remonstrance was as beautiful as the sentiments they expressed.
W"Free Thought and Official Propaganda" is a speech delivered in 1922 by Bertrand Russell on the importance of unrestricted freedom of expression in society, and the problem of the state and political class interfering in this through control of education, fines, economic leverage, and distortion of evidence.
WFreedom of Worship or Freedom to Worship is the second of the Four Freedoms oil paintings produced by the American artist Norman Rockwell. The series was based on the goals known as the Four Freedoms enunciated by the 32nd President of the United States, Franklin D. Roosevelt, in his State of the Union Address delivered on January 6, 1941. Rockwell considered this painting and Freedom of Speech the most successful of the series. Freedom of Worship was published on the 27th of February, 1943, issue of The Saturday Evening Post alongside an essay by philosopher Will Durant.
WHindu Rights Action Force, better known by its acronym HINDRAF ; with its renowned slogan of Kuasa Rakyat translated as People's Power, began as a coalition of 30 Hindu non-governmental organisations (NGOs) committed to the preservation of Hindu community rights and heritage in a multiracial Malaysia. HINDRAF has had a major impact on the political landscape of Malaysia by staging the 2007 HINDRAF rally. Following an enormous rally organised by HINDRAF in November 2007, several prominent members of the organisation were arrested, some on charges of sedition. The charges were dismissed by the courts. Five people have since been detained without trial under the Internal Security Act. Toward the end of the 2000s, the group developed a broader political program to preserve and to push for equal rights and opportunities for the minority Indians. It has been successful in continuing to focus attention on the racist aspects of Malaysian Government policies.
WThe International Religious Liberty Association (IRLA) is a non-sectarian and non-political organization promoting religious freedom. It was originally organized by the Seventh-day Adventist Church leaders in 1893 to campaign for religious freedom for all when the danger of restrictions from blue laws became apparent. Its headquarters are in Silver Spring, Maryland in the United States.
WA Letter Concerning Toleration by John Locke was originally published in 1689. Its initial publication was in Latin, and it was immediately translated into other languages. Locke's work appeared amidst a fear that Catholicism might be taking over England, and responds to the problem of religion and government by proposing religious toleration as the answer. This "letter" is addressed to an anonymous "Honored Sir": this was actually Locke's close friend Philipp van Limborch, who published it without Locke's knowledge.
WThe Liberty of Religious Worship Act 1855 was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom.
WThe Malaysian Consultative Council of Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Sikhism and Taoism is a non-profit interfaith organisation in Malaysia. Initially formed in 1983 as the "Malaysian Consultative Council of Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism and Sikhism", it is composed primarily of officials from the main non-Muslim faith communities in Malaysia and acts as a consultative and liaison body towards more open dialogue and co-operation. In 2006, Taoists were officially represented for the first time in the organisation and the name was changed to the current form in their Annual General Meeting on 27 September of the same year.
WThe Missionaries of Charity attack in Aden was a mass murder crime committed by unknown gunmen inside a home for older people in Aden, Yemen on 4 March 2016.
WThe Patent of Toleration was an edict of toleration issued on 13 October 1781 by the Habsburg emperor Joseph II. Part of the Josephinist reforms, the Patent extended religious freedom to non-Catholic Christians living in the crown lands of the Habsburg Monarchy, including Lutherans, Calvinists, and the Eastern Orthodox. Specifically, these members of minority faiths were now legally permitted to hold "private religious exercises" in clandestine churches.
WThe Scottish Episcopalians Act 1711 is an Act of the Parliament of Great Britain. Its purpose was "to prevent the disturbing those of the Episcopal Communion in Scotland in the Exercise of their Religious Worship and in the Use of the Liturgy of the Church of England and for repealing the Act passed in the Parliament of Scotland intituled Act against irregular Baptisms and Marriages".
WSection 116 of the Constitution of Australia precludes the Commonwealth of Australia from making laws for establishing any religion, imposing any religious observance, or prohibiting the free exercise of any religion. Section 116 also provides that no religious test shall be required as a qualification for any office or public trust under the Commonwealth. The product of a compromise in the pre-Federation constitutional conventions, Section 116 is based on similar provisions in the United States Constitution. However, Section 116 is more narrowly drafted than its US counterpart, and does not preclude the states of Australia from making such laws.
WSoul competency is a Christian theological perspective on the accountability of each person before God. According to the view, one's family relationships, church membership, or ecclesiastical or religious authorities cannot affect salvation of one's soul from damnation. Instead, each person is responsible to God for one's own personal faith in Jesus Christ and his death and resurrection.
WThe United States Ambassador at Large for International Religious Freedom is the ambassador at large who heads the Office of International Religious Freedom in the U.S. Department of State.
WWomen of the Wall is a non-orthodox feminist organization based in Israel whose goal is to secure the rights of women to pray at the Western Wall, also called the Kotel, in a fashion that includes singing, reading aloud from the Torah and wearing religious garments. Pew Research Center has identified Israel as one of the countries that place "high" restrictions on religion, and there have been limits placed on non-Orthodox streams of Judaism. One of those restrictions is that the Rabbi of the Western Wall has enforced gender segregation and limitations on religious garb worn by women. When the "Women of the Wall" hold monthly prayer services for women on Rosh Hodesh, they observe gender segregation so that Orthodox members may fully participate. But their use of religious garb, singing and reading from a Torah have upset many members of the Orthodox Jewish community, sparking protests and arrests. In May 2013 a judge ruled that a 2003 Israeli Supreme Court ruling prohibiting women from carrying a Torah or wearing prayer shawls had been misinterpreted and that Women of the Wall prayer gatherings at the wall should not be deemed illegal.
WThe World Index of Moral Freedom is sponsored and published by the Foundation for the Advancement of Liberty, a libertarian think tank based in Madrid, Spain. The Index is an international index ranking one hundred and sixty countries on their performance on five categories of indicators:religious freedom ; bioethical freedom ; drugs freedom ; sexual freedom, and family and gender freedom.