Posted on by Mark Movsesian

Slighting Syria’s Christians

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Armenian-Turkish New Testament, Tal Abyad, Syria

Take a look at the photo above, which appeared recently on Instagram. It’s the photo of a page from the New Testament — Acts 25, which recounts St. Paul’s trial before Festus. The page, seared into a bookshelf, is all that remains of the Bible that once contained it. ISIS recently burned the Bible, along with the Armenian Orthodox Church that held it, in Tal Abyad, Syria. The page is written in Armenian characters, but in the Turkish language, which suggests the Bible was once the possession of refugees from the Armenian Genocide of 1915. Survivors of that Genocide founded the town of Tal Abyad 100 years ag0.

I thought of this photograph while reading Nina Shea’s searing assessment, in yesterday’s National Review Online, of the US’s treatment of Syrian Christian refugees. In the past five years of the Syrian civil war, she writes, the United States has admitted a grand total of 53 Christian refugees from Syria. Fifty-three! When one considers that at the start of the conflict Christians made up 10% of the country’s population of 23 million, and that ISIS and other Islamist groups have made Christians special targets, the minuscule number of Christian refugees the US has admitted is truly shocking.

Shea says there are two explanations. First, the US has generally been reluctant to admit any refugees from Syria. Second, the US relies on the UN to process and refer applications for asylum from its own refugee and resettlement camps. But Christians and other religious minorities are reluctant to use the UN camps, which are infiltrated by ISIS operatives:

Like Iraqi Christians who opt for church-run camps over better-serviced U.N. ones, Syrian minorities fear hostility from majority groups inside the latter. According to British media, a terrorist defector asserted that militants enter U.N. camps to assassinate and kidnap Christians. An American Christian aid group reported that the U.N. camps are “dangerous” places where ISIS, militias, and gangs traffic in women and threaten men who refuse to swear allegiance to the caliphate. Such intimidation is also reportedly evident in migrant camps in Europe, leading the German police union to recommend separate shelters for Christian and Muslim migrant groups.

There are other explanations as well. The Obama Administration, like the Bush Administration before it, is reluctant to appear too solicitous of Christian refugees. The concern is that singling out Christians would cause our allies in the region to view our humanitarian efforts as sectarian. We should get over this concern. Our allies view us as sectarian, anyway. And it’s not like our strategy of projecting even-handedness has won us much support till now.

This is a complicated situation. Many Christian leaders do not want their flocks to leave their homes in Syria, where Christians have lived for many centuries. And other religious minorities are also dying in Syria, as well as Muslims. But, for many Christians, escape to the West is the only viable option. And Christians have suffered disproportionately in Syria and deserve more help from the US than they are receiving. Shea’s piece is worth reading in its entirety. You can find it here.

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Pope Francis on Freedom of Religion Today

Much of the debate surrounding issues of religious freedom today seems to center around the appropriate social role of religion, whether religion is predominantly private or is something that can—or maybe must—extend to all aspects of public life.

This question becomes more critical as new laws highlight existing tensions and create new clashes between the religious rights of individuals and the rights of others. What will be required of a California doctor who wishes not to participate in euthanasia procedures after the passage of the “right to die” law? To what extent must opponents of same-sex marriage participate in gay weddings after Obergefell v. Hodges? What accommodations should be made for service providers like the Little Sisters of the Poor who feel that complying with portions of the Affordable Care Act is against their religion?

Pope Francis offered his insight into the meaning and importance of religious liberty in the public sphere in his opening remarks at the Center’s conference on international religious freedom in June 2014. A complete English translation of his remarks is available here. He said, in part:

Reason recognizes in religious freedom a fundamental right of man that reflects his highest dignity, that of the capacity to seek the truth and to adhere to it, and recognizes in that right an indispensable condition in order to deploy his own potentialities. Religious freedom is not only the freedom of a thought or of a private sect. It is freedom to live according to ethical principles consequent to discovered truth, whether privately or publicly. This is a great challenge in the globalized world, where weak thought—which is like a disease—lowers the general ethical level, and in the name of a false notion of tolerance ends by persecuting those who defend the truth about man and that truth’s ethical consequences.

Legal regimes, national or international, are called to recognize, guarantee, and protect religious freedom, which is a right that inheres intrinsically in the nature of man, in his dignity as a free being, and is also an indicator of a healthy democracy and one of the principal fonts of the legitimacy of the state.

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Last month, when the Holy Father spoke at Independence Hall during his visit to the U.S., he highlighted similar themes. (The New York Times published an English translation of his speech here.) After reminding listeners, in the words of the Declaration of Independence, that we were created with inalienable rights, Pope Francis said this about religious freedom:

It is a fundamental right which shapes the way we interact socially and personally with our neighbors whose religious views differ from our own.

Religious freedom certainly means the right to worship God, individually and in community, as our consciences dictate. But religious liberty, by its nature, transcends places of worship and the private sphere of individuals and families.

. . . In a world where various forms of modern tyranny seek to suppress religious freedom, or try to reduce it to a subculture without right to a voice in the public square, or to use religion as a pretext for hatred and brutality, it is imperative that the followers of the various religions join their voices in calling for peace, tolerance and respect for the dignity and rights of others.

We live in a world subject to the globalization of the technocratic paradigm, which consciously aims at a one-dimensional uniformity and seeks to eliminate all differences and traditions in a superficial quest for unity. The religions thus have the right and the duty to make clear that it is possible to build a society where a healthy pluralism which respects differences and values them as such is a precious ally in the commitment to defending human dignity and a path to peace in our troubled world.

The Pope’s words challenge lawmakers, individuals, and followers of all religions (and those who are not religious as well) to see religious freedom as essential to a person’s dignity. It seems difficult today to strike a balance between the rights of believers to live according to their faith and the rights of non-believers not to have the faiths of others imposed on them. This increasing tension seems at least partially due to cultural forces that pit the religious and the secular against each other. Fewer people consider themselves to be religious than previously and both the religious and the non-religious become combative and defensive. Too often, the non-religious argue that any display of religion or act of faith is an inappropriate imposition and an attempt to establish religion as the law of the land. The religious on the other hand, claim that there is a war being waged by politicians aiming to eradicate religion altogether. Legislating in light of social and scientific developments while protecting the rights of religious believers requires careful balancing.

Pope Francis insists that relegating religion to the private sphere is not a solution to this conflict, as it would deny people the human dignity of living according to “discovered truths.” Instead, individuals must go beyond labeling those who disagree with them as either immoral or bigoted and governments must prioritize the human right to publicly practice religion and live by religious principles.

Posted on by Marc O. DeGirolami

New Law and Religion Center at Villanova Law School

Hearty congratulations to our friends at Villanova Law School on their new Center for Law and Religion!! Details are here. We look forward to many wonderful collaborations!

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Ahdash, “Copyright in Islamic Law”

In October, The Islamic Texts Society released “Copyright in Islamic Law” by Mohamed Ahdash (Muslim College, London). The publisher’s description follows:

Copyright in Islamic Law is the first work in English to systematically address the ideas of intellectual property and copyright from an Islamic perspective. The author builds a framework from within Shari’a law to address the concepts of intellectual property and copyright. In so doing, he adopts the classical usul al-fiqh approach by firstly defining the key terms associated with the field, namely: right (haq), ownership (milkiyya), wealth (mal), and utility (manfa’a). Dr Ahdash then analyses how these terms are used in the Qur’an and in the Hadith before looking at how the secondary sources of qiyas (analogy), maslaha (public interest), ‘urf (custom) and al-qawa’id al-fiqhiyya (legal maxims) can be applied to copyright. The result of this study is a framework wherein the concept of copyright is defined and understood in an Islamic manner. This then gives a consistent approach from which specific rulings can be derived. Copyright in Islamic Law is a ground-breaking study not only within Shari’a law, but also by making a contribution to the on-going debates on copyright in general.

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Alserhan, “The Principles of Islamic Marketing”

This month, Ashgate releases “The Principles of Islamic Marketing,” second edition by Baker Ahmad Alserhan (Qatar University). The publisher’s description follows:

The Principles of Islamic Marketing fills a gap in international business literature covering the aspects and values of Islamic business thought. It provides a framework and practical perspectives for understanding and implementing the Islamic marketing code of conduct. It is not a religious book.

The Islamic Economic System is a business model adopted by nearly one quarter of the world’s population. Baker Alserhan identifies the features of the Islamic structure of International Marketing practices and ethics. Adherence to such ethical practices elevates the standards of behaviour of traders and consumers alike and creates a value-loaded framework for meaningful cooperation between international marketers and their Muslim markets. His book provides a complete guide for an organization when managing its entire marketing function or when customising part of its offering to suit Muslim customers. It addresses the challenges facing marketers involved in business activities with and within Islamic communities, the knowledge needs of academic institutions, and the interest of multinationals keen on tapping the huge Islamic markets.

Along the way, Baker Alserhan provides insights into key elements such as, distribution channels, retailing practices, branding, positioning, and pricing; all within the Muslim legal and cultural norms. This second edition brings the book up to date and features a number of new case studies and two additional chapters on Maqasid Al Shariah and the Islamic economy, and a strategic perspective on Islamic marketing and branding.