Our First Freedom: How Firm a Foundation

Katrina Lantos Swett is president of the Lantos Foundation for Human Rights and Justice, cochair of the International Religious Freedom Summit, and former chair of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom. The following post is based on her remarks during the panel “Understanding Religious Freedom: Why Does It Matter?” at the ICLRS 31st Annual International Law and Religion Symposium, 7 October 2024.

At its core, religious freedom matters because it speaks to and honors that which makes humans utterly unique among all creation. We are the only inhabitants of this world who are uniquely hardwired to ask questions about the meaning of life: Who are we? Why are we here? What is our purpose? Where are we going? This unique and profound singularity of humans is the key to what gives meaning, purpose, and dignity to our lives. Socrates famously said, “the unexamined life is not worth living.”[1] Because this singular curiosity is so intrinsic to what it means to be human, protecting the quest to answer these questions and then, importantly, being allowed to live one’s life in accordance with the answers one receives truly is foundational to the whole human rights project. So many other fundamental rights flow from this wellspring right: freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of association—the most basic parental rights that are protected in the Universal Declaration. All of these flow from this wellspring right of freedom of conscience and belief. So religious freedom is important, first and foremost, because it is intrinsic to our identity and our dignity as human beings.

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Religious Freedom and Peacemaking

Knox Thames is a senior fellow at Pepperdine University and a senior visiting expert at the U.S. Institute of Peace. The following post comprises his remarks during a panel on “Understanding Religious Freedom: Why Does It Matter?” at the ICLRS 31st Annual International Law and Religion Symposium, 7 October 2024. Portions of his remarks were drawn from his book Ending Persecution: Charting the Global Path to Religious Freedom (Notre Dame Press 2024).

Introduction

There can be no durable peace without religious freedom. There may be the cold peace of a cessation of hostilities. However, lasting peace will not come until people can live together, recognizing the rights of their neighbors to pursue truth as their conscience leads without fear of discrimination or violence.

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The Zoroastrian Community Post-Religious Persecution

Malcolm M. Deboo has been president of the Zoroastrian Trust Funds of Europe since 2009. This post is based on his remarks at the AMAR International Charitable Foundation’s Windsor Dialogue Conference held at Cumberland Lodge, Windsor, England, 24 June 2024. It was published as part of the feature “Marking the 10th Anniversary of the Yazidi Genocide.”

In the West, members of my community are called Zoroastrians, based on the ancient Greek name for the Prophet Zoroaster. In Iran, however, where the faith was established, we are called Zarathushtis, after the Prophet Zarathushtra. In India, we are known as the Parsis, meaning “those who came from Persia”; that name was given by the Hindus to my religious ancestors who left Iran more than a millennium ago, sailed down the Strait of Hormuz via the Persian Gulf, and landed on the west coast of India, in South Gujarat, where they were allowed to stay as refugees. Although India is home to other communities from Iran, including Shiites, the name “Parsi” was reserved for my people. In many ways, they were some of the world’s first “boat people.”

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