Introduction to 'Religion and Human Rights: An Introduction'
John Witte, Jr. and M. Christian Green, eds., Religion and Human Rights: An Introduction (Oxford University Press, 2012), 3-24
24 Pages Posted: 20 Dec 2015 Last revised: 17 Apr 2020
Date Written: 2012
Abstract
This chapter analyzes the interaction of religion and human rights around the world, historically and today. We first describe the place of religion in the modern human rights framework and the formative role played by religious groups in the 1940s to 1960s in defining and defending human rights. We then analyze the kinds of intersecting roles of religion and human rights that are needed to build a more effective human rights culture. Along the way, we address the veritable alphabet of issues that now deeply trouble and divide the world: apostasy, blasphemy, conversion, defamation, evangelization, fundamentalism, genocide, homicide, injustice, and jihad.
Keywords: Religion; Human Rights; Religious Freedom; United Nations; Universal Declaration of Human Rights; Eleanor Roosevelt; Religious Persecution; Apostasy; Blasphemy; Universal Islamic Declaration of Human Rights; Cairo Declaration of Human Rights; Second Vatican Council; Dignitatis Humanae; John Noonan
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