The Autonomy of the Individual in the Sect and the Ability to Form Democratic Communities: Tolerance and Freedom of Conscience

Max Weber ◽  
2008 ◽  
pp. 277-289
Keyword(s):  
Freedom Of Conscience ◽  
Democratic Communities ◽  
The Individual

A Veiled Threat: Belcacemi and Oussar v Belgium

2018 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 190-200
Author(s):  
Jasper Doomen
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Law ◽  
Freedom Of Conscience ◽  
Unequal Treatment ◽  
The Face ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Full Face ◽  
The Right

The freedom of the individual can easily come into conflict with his or her obligation to integrate in society. The case of Belcacemi and Oussar v Belgium provides a good example. It is evident that some restrictions of citizens’ freedoms must be accepted for a state to function and, more basically, persist; as a consequence, it is acceptable that certain demands, incorporated in criminal law, are made of citizens. The issue of the extent to which such restrictions are justified has increasingly become a topic of discussion. The present case raises a number of important questions with respect to the right to wear a full-face veil in public if the societal norm is that the face should be visible, the most salient of which are whether women should be ‘protected’ from unequal treatment against their will and to what extent society may impose values on the individual. I will argue that Belgian law places unwarranted restrictions on citizens and that the values behind it testify to an outlook that is difficult to reconcile with the freedom of conscience and religion.

‘The Free Sale of Opium’: The Reaction of Russian Orthodox Churchmen to Freedom of Conscience, 1864–1905

2019 ◽  
Vol 49 (2) ◽  
pp. 203-230
Author(s):  
James White
Keyword(s):  
Status Quo ◽  
Russian Revolution ◽  
Private Sphere ◽  
Russian Orthodox ◽  
Freedom Of Conscience ◽  
Wide Audience ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Church

This article examines discussions of freedom of conscience and other religious liberties in the Orthodox ecclesiastical press between the Great Reforms of the 1860s and the first Russian Revolution in 1905. Avoiding highly influential and well-known religious thinkers, this piece instead focuses on forgotten ordained and lay writers who used their positions in the Church's hierarchy and educational establishments to reach a wide audience. At the heart of their views was a paradox: while frequently defining Christ as freedom and rejecting coercion in religious matters, these churchmen assailed freedom of conscience as morally dangerous and socially destructive. To explain this paradox and reveal why freedom of conscience allegedly posed such a threat, the article situates the writers in the institutional, intellectual, and political contexts of both the Church and the Russian Empire. Examining this is useful not only because it provides an example of how Russian Orthodox churchmen theologically justified the status quo of the empire's religious policy but also because it demonstrates how members of a state church perceived the shift of religion away from collective confessional ascription towards the individual, private sphere.

scholarly journals Religious Tolerance, Freedom of Conscience, Freedom of Religion and Belief in the period of Establishment of Christianity

2020 ◽  
pp. 10-19
Author(s):  
Mykhailo Babii
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Freedom Of Religion ◽  
Freedom Of Conscience ◽  
Christian Church ◽  
Christian Understanding ◽  
Evolution Of Ideas ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Right ◽  
Spiritual Freedom

The author examines the process of establishment of Christian understanding of freedom of conscience and freedom of religion and tolerance. In doing so, he draws on the achievements of the Greek and Greek-Roman traditions of interpreting freedom of conscience. The time of late antiquity accounts for the time of organizational establishment and strengthening of the new religion - Christianity. Describing this period, the author notes the presence of a variety of cults and sects in which foreign gods (in particular, Egyptian and Iranian) were worshiped. In this situation, individuals were free to choose their faith and satisfy their personal need for spiritual connection with God or gods. Against the background of the fall of the authority of ancient religions, the emergence and strengthening of the Emperor cult Christians seek recognition by the authorities, the equation of rights. After all, Christianity becomes a state religion. At this time, a new religious paradigm was emerging that could be a factor in the multi-ethnic, multi-tribal, or multilingual unity of the Roman Empire. The tendency of growing interest in monotheistic, in particular Jewish, religion became noticeable: the idea of one and all-pervading God was opposed to ancient polytheism. The article reveals the peculiarities of the Christian understanding of freedom, which underlies the inner personal spiritual freedom bestowed by God. Christianity the first formulated the idea of freedom of religious conscience as freedom to choose religion. In addition to the individual dimension of freedom of conscience, Christianity has actualized the community's right to freedom of religion, freedom of outside religion, and worship. At the same time, it theoretically substantiated these rights and practically required its observance by the authorities. The legitimacy of the affirmation of the principle of freedom of religious conscience is the Milan edict of 313, which opened the union of the Christian church and the state, as well as the constitutionalization of the Christian church as a state church. This provoked persecution on religious grounds and the struggle of different movements, both within Christianity and beyond, for the right to freedom of religion, the free expression of their religious beliefs. Christianity significantly influenced the evolution of ideas about freedom of conscience, becoming the semantic nucleus of its modern understanding. However, early Christianity proved to be a force that, in the struggle for its claim, was repeatedly harassed, but also resorted to persecution of dissenters, showing intolerance to other worldviews and religions.

scholarly journals Freedom of Conscience as a Subject of Contemporary Controversies

2021 ◽  
Vol 90 (5) ◽  
pp. 585-606
Author(s):  
Marian Machinek
Keyword(s):  
Social Life ◽  
Three Dimensions ◽  
Moral Truth ◽  
Moral Integrity ◽  
Freedom Of Conscience ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Guardian ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Voice

One of the important reasons why the issue of freedom of conscience is one of the most controversial problems of modern times is the ongoing dispute over its definition. In the context of the contemporary emphasis on the moral autonomy of the person, the recent definitions of conscience as the “voice of God” sound at least ambiguous. It is therefore important to point out the various dimensions of conscience. The first and basic one is the individual dimension: conscience is defined as moral self-consciousness in its deepest, personal dimension. It can therefore, following E. Fromm, be described as the “guardian of moral integrity.” However, in addition to this, conscience also points out to “what is common” (J. Ratzinger), to the fundamental values that make social life possible. It is therefore also a carrier of moral truth. Finally, conscience touches upon the relationship with God and this is where its important religious dimension is expressed. It is only when each of these three dimensions of conscience is taken into account that the question of its freedom can be adequately considered. It concerns, above all, the relationship of an individual conscience to an external authority, both in social and ecclesiastical context.

scholarly journals Problematic Aspects of Measuring the Legal Status of Neo-Religions in Ukraine

2007 ◽  
pp. 95-99
Author(s):  
Mykhailo Yu. Babiy
Keyword(s):  
Legal Status ◽  
Religious Organizations ◽  
Freedom Of Religion ◽  
Freedom Of Conscience ◽  
Religious Expression ◽  
Effective Mechanism ◽  
Legal Norms ◽  
Collective Levels ◽  
Scientific Reflection ◽  
The Individual

First of all, I consider it necessary to note that the full value of freedom of existence of religious organizations (all without exception) operating in the territory of our country, the realization of their tasks, goals depends first of all on the effective mechanism of their legal support and legal guarantees. It is clear that the legal norms fixed in the legislation of Ukraine, which relate to the sphere of freedom of religion, concern only the plane of realization of freedom of conscience - freedom of religious expression both at the individual and the collective levels. This is an extremely pressing issue that needs scientific reflection.

scholarly journals Axiological challenges of the individual religiosity of the Orthodox believer in conditions of religious freedom and freedom of conscience

2017 ◽  
pp. 99-107 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hanna Kulagina-Stadnichenko
Keyword(s):  
Religious Freedom ◽  
Human Existence ◽  
Self Determination ◽  
Freedom Of Conscience ◽  
Religious Motivation ◽  
New Type ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Individual ◽  
First Time ◽  
Metaphysical Status

Today, researchers are increasingly concerned about the loss of humanity's landmarks of their development, which, naturally, leads to attempts to realize the goals and meanings of being an individual through the religious motivation of the formation of his outlook. In the XXI century, for the first time, the existential states of man, that is, his life's self-determination and election, not only became the object of conceptual reflection, but also acquired a qualitatively new metaphysical status, in contrast to the traditional one, became the subject of another, existential, method of philosophizing. System-forming concepts of a new type of reflection have become "man", "existence", "personality", "consciousness" instead of earlier established categories of "world", "being", "essence". As a result, world events are now interpreted as subjective or radically dependent on the subject. From this perspective, the analysis of the existentialities of human existence (in particular, the phenomena of freedom, love, holiness), the elucidation and realization of their heuristic, ontological, epistemological, and methodological potential of Orthodoxy - seems to be a very topical task.

scholarly journals Wolność sumienia i religii w Konstytucji Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej - postulaty Kościoła katolickiego

2008 ◽  
Vol 51 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 371-383
Author(s):  
Paweł Sobczyk
Keyword(s):  
Catholic Church ◽  
Religious Freedom ◽  
The State ◽  
Second Vatican Council ◽  
Freedom Of Conscience ◽  
Vatican Council ◽  
Systemic Transformation ◽  
Liberal Ideology ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Individual Dimension

The systemic transformation initiated by the Roundtable talks of 1989 made it necessary for Poland to amend its constitution, including the regulations concerning the freedom of conscience and religion. It was natural for churches and religious organisations, including the Catholic Church, to participate in the constitutional debate. The study, reflecting only the Catholic Church’s official positions, presents issues concerning the Catholic Church’s position on religious freedom in the individual dimension, that is, the freedom of conscience and religion. The Conference of the Polish Episcopate’s 1990-1997 positions on religious freedom in the individual dimensions contained some of the most important aspects of the teaching of the Second Vatican Council. These represented the basis of the Episcopate’s position in the several-year-long debate on the desired model of the state. The constitutional guarantees of religious freedom contained in the article 53 (freedom of conscience and religion) should be seen as a compromise between the principles of liberal ideology and the teachings of the Vaticanum II.

Exemptions for Religion or Conscience under the Canopy of the Rule of Law

2017 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 185-213 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rex Ahdar
Keyword(s):  
Rule Of Law ◽  
Freedom Of Conscience ◽  
Religious Minorities ◽  
The Rule Of Law ◽  
Default Position ◽  
The Law ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Right

This essay endeavours to restate the case for the right to freedom of conscience and religion. Specifically, it seeks to make the case for exemptions from the law of the land for religious believers and similarly-situated citizens who hold sincere conscientious beliefs. The rule of law is not something to be ignored, and carving out exemptions for conscience has been criticized as unfair, anomalous, potentially open-ended in scope, and difficult to administer. I attempt to assuage these legitimate concerns by underscoring the importance of the dignity of the individual and the virtue of protecting religious minorities (and dissenters of all stripes), who challenge the conventions of the day. If the default position is the rule of law, believers face an uphill task. Ultimately, only a truly liberal polity can offer protection to what, in every age, is a fragile liberty.

Case Note: Belcacemi and Oussar v Belgium App no 37798/13 (ECtHR, 11 July 2017)

ICL Journal ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 213-223 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jasper Doomen
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Law ◽  
Case Note ◽  
Freedom Of Conscience ◽  
Unequal Treatment ◽  
The Face ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Full Face ◽  
The Right

Abstract The freedom of the individual can easily come into conflict with his or her obligation to integrate in society. The present case provides a good example. That some restrictions of citizens’ freedoms must be accepted for a state to function and, more basically, persist is evident and that, as a consequence, certain demands, incorporated in criminal law, are made from citizens is acceptable. The issue to what extent such restrictions are justified has increasingly become a topic of discussion. The present case raises a number of important questions with respect to the right to wear a full-face veil in public if the societal norm is that the face should be visible, the most salient of which are whether women should be ‘protected’ from unequal treatment against their will and to what extent society may impose values on the individual. I will argue that the Belgian law places unwarranted restrictions on citizens and that the values behind it testify to an outlook that is difficult to reconcile with the freedom of conscience and religion.

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